The 90 day Maryland 2012 legislative session is 1/3 completed. The 1st 30 days featured introduction of bills and the budget; the second 30 days will focus on bill hearings; and the third and final 30 days will involve voting on bills in committee and resolving the budget issues. (This last 30 days is the period where things get done – good or bad.)

SB 237 will be heard in the Senate Finance Committee on February 14th. While the mechanics are different from last year’s bill that died in committee in both the House and the Senate, the cost impact to commercial and industrial electricity users appears to be higher than in last year’s bill.

Governor O’Malley’s budget includes a proposal to increase Maryland’s personal income tax for “higher” income taxpayers by cutting back on the personal exemptions and itemized deductions. (See attached charts for examples of the impact on various income level taxpayers.) The proposed changes are effective for the 2012 calendar year. They are expected to raise approximately $180 million for the State and another roughly $110 million for local governments for FY 2013. (Note: thus far there appears to be a “cool” reception to these income tax increase proposals.)

The Budget: while the details (including the actual bills) are not yet available, according to press reports the Governor’s FY13 budget will include higher personal income taxes for taxpayers with incomes in excess of $100,000 for individual filers and $150,000 for joint returns. The increases will come in the form of reduced personal exemptions and caps on personal deductions. The increase will be effective for the 2012 taxable year.

Today’s Baltimore Sun contained the following editorial calling for enactment of combined reporting if Senator Ed Kasemeyer’s idea of cutting the corporate income tax rate is pursued. (Sen. Kasemeyer is the Chair of the Senate Budget & Taxation Committee.)
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Forbes has just released its new ranking of Best States for Business (and Careers) for 2011.

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It was an interesting day in Glen Burnie’s Baymeadow Industrial Park. In this case, intriguing, even.

It’s a great occasion when a business leases 125,000 square feet in a big industrial park, but the deal signed by Chesapeake Bay Candle represented more than an economic development victory for Anne Arundel County and Maryland; it marked the opening of a manufacturing facility that could have gone elsewhere in the world, but chose Maryland.

That led to not only the hiring of 30 workers in the area (with the hope of adding 70 more within the year), but talk of an uptick in a manufacturing sector that often has been discussed in the past tense in recent years as it lost jobs in droves and often companies, due to the often lower costs of doing business abroad in locales like China, India and Mexico.

While that still happens, its appears that the tables may be turning somewhat; and that some companies are finding out that doing business in the U.S. is the most efficient way for them to go, due to such factors as exchange rates that are evening, high fuel costs and dependable domestic distribution networks.
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