Thursday, September 20, 2012

Pennsylvania News: Small Business Regulatory Reform; Work Requirement for Welfare; Natural Gas Impact Fees


Governor Tom Corbett, a Republican, signed the Small Business Regulatory Reform act approved by the Republican majority General Assembly, which requires the impact of regulations on small businesses to be assessed.  If the regulation adversely affects business, the regulatory agency must substitute a less-burdensome regulation.

Corbett also rejected the potential waiver offered by the Obama Administration of the work requirement for welfare recipients, according to the Commonwealth Foundation.

Pennsylvania reported that the Commonwealth has received $206 million in impact fees for natural gas drilling this year.  Last year, the state legislature passed and Corbett signed a principled impact fee into law, resisting pressure to single out the natural gas industry to impose a tax on natural gas drilling in addition to all the usual state corporate income and asset taxes they already pay.  This figure does not include all of those taxes paid to county and municipal governments, as well as all of the tax revenue generated from tens of thousands of jobs and other economic activity, including royalties for landowners.

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