Print Column: Should the Legacy Fund Be Used Only to Grow Government?

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MINOT, N.D. – North Dakota House Republicans have resurrected an idea to use Legacy Fund earnings as a way to reduce and eventually eliminate the state’s income tax.

This is a unique idea among proposals for how to use the billions we’ve tucked away in that piggy bank in that it’s the only one which reduces the burden of government on North Dakota taxpayers.

Every other proposal – from dumping more money into our already bloated university system to building a presidential library in Medora – grows government.

That’s not to say all of those proposals are bad. I very much support the library.

My point is that if we’re not careful, the Legacy Fund could become a fuel cell for growing government.

A pot of billions and billions of dollars used to fund one project or another while North Dakotans continue to shoulder the same tax burdens.

It doesn’t have to be that way.

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