Everybody hates Wal-Mart…

…which is why it’s now the largest company in America. George Will looks at Maryland’s latest cash-grab scheme from the country’s #1 employer:

Something not easily distinguished from theft recently occurred in Annapolis. In legislation ostensibly concerned with any company with 10,000 employees but pertaining only to one, Maryland has said Wal-Mart must spend 8 percent of its payroll on health care, or must give the difference to the state.

Will views this novel maneuver as just the latest version of looking-for-quarters-in-the-couch-cushions approach to funding state governments:

This is part of the tawdry drama of state politics as governments grasp for novel sources of money. Forty-eight states are to varying degrees dependent on revenues from gambling. Forty-six states are addicted to their cut, to be paid out over decades, from the $246 billion coerced from the tobacco industry by using the specious argument that smoking costs their governments huge sums. As a result, 46 states have a stake in the long-term profitability of tobacco companies.

Maryland's grasping for Wal-Mart's revenues opens a new chapter in the degeneracy of state governments that are eager to spend more money than they have the nerve to collect straightforwardly in taxes.

Unless they turn back from the abyss, Maryland will face the same economic ruin visited by every government that tries to squeeze businesses for short-term revenues. From McQ on Q&O:

The good news, in this particular scenario, is that Wal-Mart has the ability and the will to make Maryland and others regret such legislation. The sad part of that is to do so, it will probably affect the lives of many of its present employees within that state, and that's a pity. But when the pink slip comes, and when the store in the neighborhood closes, ex-employees and consumers can thank the Maryland legislature. Hopefully their thanks will come in the form of a vote against those in the legislature who perpetrated this absurd law.

There’s a reason that 48 states have a lottery: it’s essentially a tax on people who can’t do math. In a more perfect world, state governments wouldn’t try to trick its citizens into thinking that a windfall is just six numbers away. The lack of spending restraint – along with balanced budget laws – has forced state governments into imaginative new ways to scavenge revenues. Unfortunately for those unfamiliar with the definition of insanity, the lure of deep-pocket businesses invariably leads to policies that hurt the people in the long run.