Senator McKinney: Tax & Spending Hikes Scaring Potential Investors

Connecticut Senate Minority Leader John McKinney (R-Fairfield) today pointed to a prominent government investment expert’s comments about Connecticut as evidence that the governor’s spending and tax hikes have put Connecticut on the wrong path.

In an interview with MoneyShow.com, Marilyn Cohen of Bond Smart Investor cited Connecticut as a state for investors to avoid.

“Connecticut – it’s a small state. They’re just gouging-gouging their residents, and you know what? Money is portable,” Cohen said in the interview. “The state of Maryland showed us that, when a few years ago they put on a millionaire’s tax and baked that into their budgets. Guess what? They found that the [millionaires]..moved to Virginia.”

“Here we have a prominent figure in the investment world saying what Connecticut Republicans have been saying since the governor unveiled his budget,” McKinney said. “We have a spending addiction in Hartford. To feed that addiction, we are raising taxes by record amounts on residents and businesses. Meanwhile our neighboring states are cutting spending and cutting taxes. Investors are watching Connecticut closely and they do not like what they see. They cannot comprehend why our governor and democrats in the legislature are spending more and more despite the fact that Connecticut is in dire straits already.”

The budget proposed by the governor and revised by Democratic legislators increases spending by $434.5 million in the next fiscal year and by $894.7 million over the biennium. It raises Connecticut taxes by more than $1.9 billion in the next fiscal year and by $3.7 billion over the biennium. This is the largest tax increase in state history.

“Governor Malloy’s taxing and spending binges will hurt job growth in our state for many, many years to come,” McKinney said. “We can only hope that these brutally honest comments from Ms. Cohen will serve as a wake-up call to Democrats at the State Capitol.”

Cohen’s Connecticut comments come at the 3:44 mark in the attached video link:

http://www.moneyshow.com/video/video.asp?wid=6936&t=3&scode=018336