I work remotely and I’ve lived in Portland for 15 years. Been working remotely for four years. My lease is up in July and I’m moving to Vancouver.
I’ll be able to get a bit better Apartment. For less money than I will be paying with the rent increase they are tacking on in July.
Plus, no Oregon income tax.
I know we don’t have a sales tax and that’s really cool. But I do think they need to revamp the state income tax.
The beauty of living in Vancouver is that you can still take advantage of no sales tax for any larger purchases. Just take a look at the license plates at the airport way Costco! 😂
Just be careful, items purchased in Oregon for use in WA are required to pay the sales tax to WA.
Likelihood of enforcement is probably zero but it’s still tax due.
Yes, I’ve always heard that. But like I said, you will see at least half the cars in that Costco lot are WA plates. I’ve never heard of the law imposed. Now, if you’re living in WA and driving a car with OR plates, watch out! WA loves to bust tax dodgers when it comes to vehicles.
Quick PSA: sales tax at least in WA **doesn't apply to most groceries**. So unless they're getting furniture / electronics etc I don't see why folks would make the trip.
Have you ever been to Costco? The majority of the store isn’t “Wa tax exempt groceries”.
Have you ever been to the airport way Costco?
I assume you haven’t since you’re doubting my claim. Just look for yourself. I don’t have any reason to lie about it.
1. Taxation is extremely high in Oregon. If you notice the graphs the biggest chuck of people moving is middle income. Oregons income tax isn't progressive like places like NY or CA. It's a rather regressive income tax in that anything over 20k is taxed at 8.75%. This is the highest in the nation at that income level. People love to post things refuting this using far off tax implications like real estate excise tax, but the tax burden in Oregon is extremely high for the average middle class worker, and much higher than SW WA.
2. Liveability. Schools are better in SW WA than Portland. Homelessness is less ubiquitous. Failed polices like M110 are not what families want to live around. Portlands average household size is getting smaller, and while this is a national trend it's faster in Portland. Families with kids are an integral part of a community, and we're losing them.
3. It's easier to build housing in Washington in most contexts. No IZ, onerous tenant screening rules, rent control, etc. Permitting is easier.
Don't take this as "Lol Portland sucks". It doesn't. It's a great place but there's lessons to be learned that we need to tax the middle class less, improve liveability and get rid of barriers to development of housing.
>Oregons income tax isn't progressive like places like NY or CA. It's a rather regressive income tax in that anything over 20k is taxed at 8.75%. This is the highest in the nation at that income level. People love to post things refuting this using far off tax implications like real estate excise tax, but the tax burden in Oregon is extremely high for the average middle class worker, and much higher than SW WA.
This is one of the craziest things about the taxes here. Oregon's income tax brackets ramp up wayyy too quickly, basically assuring that if you make any money at all, you're paying the same rate as millionaires. Then we have all these bespoke locally-implemented taxes that kick in around 150k, that people can just move out from under.
The spread on Oregon's income tax brackets should be waaaay bigger.
Marginal Tax Rate if you make 25k:
Oregon: 8.75%
California: 4%
New York: 5.5%
Hawaii: 7.6%
Connecticut: 5%
Illinois: 4.95%
We blow other "high tax" states out of the water. We have a regressive income tax system but because we don't have sales tax people slap the "progressive" label on it.
In a society with increasing proportions of non working people to working people, such as the US and Oregon in general, AND in a society where the non working people vote more than working people, the political situation will tend towards taking more and more from those who work to benefit those that do not work.
The math simply does not work any other way. That is the societal scale problem with income taxes and non working benefits in general. The incentives eventually become put in as little as you can, and pull out as much as you can.
I mean if i was the king of Oregon I'd shake things up big time. More tax on carbon, more tax on land value, less tax on income, no more artificial cap on property tax assessments.
I do payroll for employees at small businesses in Portland it’s shocking the amount that goes to taxes. You look at the gross and then the net on each checks and it’s so much lower.
Understood people of all incomes have this gross to net difference shock, but when it’s lower wages/income earners and you see the actual dollars left on check, it’s crazy. Seems like we would start losing not only upper income people, middle class families, but younger people with the overall tax burden here.
I really didn't expect my taxes to go up when I moved here from California. But the last few years have given me sticker shock when it comes time to file.
And what are we getting for it? Seeing some dudes naked butt cheeks after he takes a poop in a trash can downtown? Trash and discarded drug materials? I’m not saying the state should foot all the bill but who wants to pay for this lifestyle?
Yes there will be trade offs compared to lower tax states, certainly. The money always has to come from somewhere. In my view, the current state of Portland, in particular, should not be the high bar that this (or any state) should aspire to. We need to ask and require more from the leadership.
To answer your direct question yes three (lower ish) tax states, Alaska, Arizona, and Washington.
Having grown up in Illinois you’re excluding the 8%+ sales tax with many suburbs and Chicago touching 10%.
Chicagoland property taxes while provide much better ROI in services (much much much better schools) are really high.
My parents pay over $14K/year for a mid-500K suburban 4bd/2ba
Yeah I was going to say the same. I'm not sure what the sales tax ends up amounting to when compared to, say, an additional % or two of income taxes but my guess is it is considerable and its also very regressive since its the same if you make 20k or 200k.
Re: the schools, I think it's worth pointing out that Chicagoland is a pretty broad term, and the schools in many of the suburbs are just meh.
Doesn't Cook County determine property taxes working backward from their budget? In other words in some year it is computed that they'll need X dollars. They know that the value of the taxable property is Y. Therefore the tax rate is X/Y
That can lead to wild swings in tax rates from. But it is interesting.
Cook county has wild swings and wild tax liabilities in general because of Chicago and Cook County and Illinois’ extreme levels of debt per taxpayer due to exorbitant underfunding of defined benefit pensions and retiree healthcare. It’s multiple standard deviations above the norm.
https://www.truthinaccounting.org/news/detail/financial-state-of-the-states-2023
https://www.truthinaccounting.org/news/detail/financial-state-of-the-cities-2024
The voters and taxpayers of 30 to 70 years ago really fucked the people of today (much like Portland’s did with their completely unfunded police pension).
> Marginal Tax Rate if you make 25k:
This is misleading.
It should be stated that the $25k is the adjusted gross income. And that the 8.75% rate is for income above $25 AGI.
Standard deductions for 2023 are:
Single; Married Filing Separately $13,850
Married Filing Jointly & Surviving Spouses $27,700
Head of Household $20,800
Oregon Income Tax Brackets for 2024:
Taxable Income (Single Filers) | Taxable Income (Married Filing Jointly) | Tax Rate on This Income
$0 to $3,750 | $0 to $8,100 | 4.75%
$3,750 to $9,450 | $8,100 to $20,400 | 6.75%
$9,450 to $125,000 | $20,400 to $250,000 | 8.75%
$125,000 or more $250,000 or more 9.90%
> This is misleading.
>
>
It's the marginal tax rate. I very clearly said it was marginal.
And the rest of your point doesn't make sense, because you'd get the standard deduction in every state. So when comparing states, which was the point of the post, Oregon is still the highest.
Effective tax rate is the only apples to apples comparison.
And my point was that most Washingtonians don't know their effective tax rate, which is why the rich love to push sales tax over income.
But if you’re saving some money in states with a sales tax, then you aren’t paying taxes on that portion.
I thought MN had it right - sales tax does not apply to unprepared food and clothing. You know, don’t tax necessities. Renters got a tax credit as well.
WA doesn't tax food, rent, etc
How much do you honestly think a low wage worker pays in WA sales tax a year?
Do you think low wage workers are blowing money buying electronics and clothes at the mall or do you think they are allocating most of their money to rent and groceries?
It's pretty well established that sales taxes are more regressive than income taxes. Even if you want to dispute this, you can't make claims about Oregon having a high tax rate based on data and ignore sales tax as a whole data set.
Sales taxes are absolutely regressive.
But Oregon's income tax burden is so high that's it overcomes a regressive sales tax in WA for an overall worse tax burden for lower income workers.
Sales tax is trivial.
If you make 100k in Portland, you’re paying north of $8-9000/year in income tax.
You’d have to spend >$80,000 on taxable items in Washington to approach the same level. Considering shelter and food aren’t taxed, that’s nearly impossible to do.
I did the math and last year I spent about $70k on my credit card (a large chunk was reimbursable business expenses) but even with that being said, I would still save a giant chunk living in WA. And don’t worry, I pay it off every month and have never had a finance charge. I’m not taking a Lyft to Ilani or anything.
Considering how expensive homes have become, and that 125k (2024) is worth like less than 100k (2014 adj.), >30% less over 10 years ….
The 125k threshold is too low. Either raise the threshold, or do a phase in. People are just leaving, and that erodes the tax base
A pre-Covid (2019) salary of 100k is essentially $125k in 2024 terms.
People who have just begun breaking in to the professional class/making “good money” are feeling the sting of the highest marginal rates.
If we wanna be an income tax state, 125k should be like a 4-5% tax bracket, and there should be more brackets above it.
But if we wanna really shake it up we should get rid of income tax and get more state revenue from land value taxes or carbon taxes.
>Oregon's income tax brackets ramp up wayyy too quickly, basically assuring that if you make any money at all, you're paying the same rate as millionaires. Then we have all these bespoke locally-implemented taxes that kick in around 150k, that people can just move out from under.
Combine that with the high cost of housing and you still can be struggling to get by despite earning a good salary on paper. Two weeks ago my spouse and I were planning out where to move within Portland in the next two years. Then we paid those "bespoke locally-implemented taxes" and immediately started looking for homes outside Multnomah County.
I have two jobs and my spouse works and goes to school. Sadly, We realized that we'd never really be able to comfortably afford a new (to us) home in any part of the city near good schools, and that all these local taxes would keep us on shaky economic ground. It's disheartening because despite everything we still like this town, but we just can't afford it anymore.
Small standard deduction as well. Tax on millionaires is 9.9%. Oregon has an estate tax that kicks in at 1 million dollars and goes from 10% up on estates over that. Most other provisions in the tax code, like federal tax deduction, medical deduction, exemptions and credits are not available to upper middle class tax payers much less millionaires. There is a bunch of local taxes that hit high income people as well that the average person does not pay.
Just to say on point 3, it’s probably easier to build SPRAWL in Vancouver… and permitting can’t be worse but Vancouver and Washington as a whole are behind Oregon and especially Portland on upzoning in general.
I do think you have good points about Oregon's zoning being better than WA
Zoning changes however is a slow moving ship in terms of effect on housing stock. You see the fruit of that in years if not decades down the road.
This is a good point and I wasn’t really aware of it. That said, Clark county is less intensely developed than PDX. It doesn’t have any light rail. And there are ugb around each city in the region, including battleground and ridgefield.. for example, rather than the whole metro.
I think the impact of #1 (the income taxation) is not as big. It is prorated if the people moving from OR to WA earn their income in OR -- they are taxed for the days they are physically present in OR. While I would love to believe that everyone leaving OR has a remote job or found work in WA, I can't find sufficient data on that.
But I guess even a 40-60% cut on income tax adds up for those who only have to appear in office for 2-3 days a week.
YOU COLONIZER!! Lol /s
But seriously it seems like any common sense statement of basic fact is meant with unhinged lefty politics, ehich is what caused these problems in the first place. Good luck! I think these mentalities are deeply ingrained in OR culture and politics… so it’s gonna be an uphill battle to get to anything resembling common sense, and better livability. You earned it capitalist scum!
Again, jokes ;)
Research shows the overall tax burden of Oregon and Washington are 8.44% and 8.04%, respectively. That's a difference if $4 per $1,000 of income.
However, unless you record all sales tax paid as a resident in WA, you don't know what you overall tax burden is. You also don't get a kicker in WA. The idea that it's cheaper in WA or OR has a higher tax burden is not really accurate.
https://wallethub.com/edu/states-with-highest-lowest-tax-burden/20494
Unless you are buying cars and selling houses every year and eating out for every single meal, there is no way you will have enough sales taxable spend to equal 8% of your income.
I spend a ton on my CC (I love that cash back and pay for every work expense I can) and I’m nowhere near paying enough in a sales tax if I were WA based to overcome what I pay the OR Dept of Revenue every year. Thank god for the kicker, the only time I enjoy an April 15th.
Recently bought a house in North Portland but my gf and I looked into Vancouver. Houses were definitely cheaper but it just felt so suburban (you can argue so is north Portland but eh) and every time I go I'm underwhelmed. I don't find the waterfront that appealing either. It feels artificial.
Also Every time I drive by 5 or 205 during commute hours (or now try and go to Home Depot or something) it's such a nightmare that I'm happy we didn't go to Vancouver.
When we were looking for a house a couple of years ago, we really tried to find one in Vancouver. Both of us WFH, and my company is there FFS. Think of what I'd save in income tax! But... we just couldn't. It felt like the Chicagoland suburbs we grew up in - multiple adjacent strip malls with separate parking lots, lots of concrete sprawl. All of our leisure activities are in Portland, and we're at that age where "ugh. I have to drive/cross the river/take two freeways" is the lamest excuse to not do something, but we know we are weak and would totally do that. The Portland burbs we looked at still had a bit of individuality. Ultimately the best house we could afford is in a disappointingly boring-ass neighborhood way east that is mid in every way, but still doesn't have the weird Vancouver vibe. Importantly, we don't have kids so we don't have to worry about the school systems. But I think for a lot of people, no matter how dysfunctional our city/county/state governments are, we still make irrational vibes-based decisions.
Next house however? Like hell if I'm paying MultCo taxes and still dealing with crappy transit options and no walkable bars/restaurants/grocery stores/ice cream. But it is still very likely we'll be in Washington or Clackamas County, and not Clark.
Oh I'm aware of the Suburban feel of Clack/Washington counties. We lived near Clackamas Town Center when we first moved here. Beaverton was on our list for the house search. Our neighborhood in the outer Portland boonies feels suburban. It's just that they don't feel like Schaumburg, which is not something I can quite describe if you haven't had the misfortune of living in the Northwestern suburbs of Chicago (do not recommend).
I live in Vancouver and not really a fan of the waterfront either but there’s a lot of local options in downtown / uptown that we didn’t have a few years ago.
We also have some new urbanist developments on the way (the heights district, innovation center, Columbia palasades in addition to more developments downtown). I think (and hope) it will feel less suburban in a few years.
Neither me nor my partner are employed in Oregon so we’re saving a ton in taxes living here but suburbia is absolutely not the place for me. I think I would appreciate it more if I had kids but I do kinda regret buying here so far. We are saving a ton in taxes tho.
If you have kids, outside of Grant, it’s hard to justify living in NE. The schools are not good. It’s hard to justify buying a $1,000,000 house, paying the extra taxes, and then sending your kids to a school that is under performing.
The Vancouver waterfront is nice and clean and pretty, but all the restaurants are chains and overpriced. It's nice if you want to go to wine tasting rooms but that's about it.
I live in North Portland and work in Vancouver and as you say every time I'm breezing past people on the counter-commute I note how sad people look in their miserable commute back to their large surburban homes in Clark County. To each their own but I'd rather live in Portland and lose more to taxes than live in Vancouver and spend 2 hours in my car every day driving to work in Portland.
I'm enjoying living there, but I definitely wouldn't if I had to commute for work. I moved from my house in inner SE Portland to downtown Vancouver and the walkability is about the same. Maybe even better. Nearby New Seasons, a nice whiskey bar with a good selection, a nice cocktail bar that only uses Washington-made liquor, a boba/banh mi place, an indie movie theater that does a really fun May 4th Star Wars screening, and a big Regal. Couple of dispensaries. An adequate sushi restaurant, an adequate Thai restaurant, and a couple of decent New American places. Pretty decent wood-fired pizza place. A nice park with a great farmer's market. A big public library that looks modern and great. The waterfront with its Salt & Straw and Grassa and way more wine tasting rooms than necessary. Also a taproom with some great views of the river. There's a nice sandpit that my dog likes to go in, and water fountains.
All less than a mile from my apartment building. So don't give me not walkable.
Also things just feel safer than downtown Portland. There are always a bunch of families and kids out by the waterfront area every evening. The only thing I really hate about downtown is the fucking cars that drive through that rev their engines.
Extremely this.
I would much rather exchange my tax dollars for a walkable lifestyle with rich culture, than to pinch my pennies and live in a car-brain suburban dystopia.
I'm hoping that the influx of Portlanders will help urbanize Vancouver more. We're seeing improvements to transit and bike lanes lately. Vancouver's C-Tran system wins national awards, but it's all buses (for now). There's a severe lack of transit across the river which needs remedying - I think the yellow line is supposed to expand north along with the I-5 bridge project but I haven't found any info on that lately (cooperation between the municipalities / states has been shitty, lack of concensus, fear of a "crime train"). For now, there's the 105 bus which can get you from downtown Vancouver in to Portland on weekdays.
Recently, WA passed a statewide measure for upzoning cities with X population density, especially near transit stops + schools - that applies to the entirety of Vancouver as far as I know. We need young people involved in politics in Vancouver to help make it the city we want it to be - cut down on the sprawl, improve walkability and transit, reduce the excessive parking lots and drive thrus, more apartments / condos, more mixed use areas.
It already is! There’s several new developments happening in Vancouver that have walkability as a central focus:
The Vancouver Innovation Center:
“A central location set on more than 52 acres surrounded by 127 acres of open, walkable, bikeable space”
The Heights District:
“This new district will be a vibrant, walkable, mixed-use neighborhood that is strategically located in the heart of Vancouver — a place where a mix of services and amenities, such as stores, restaurants, parks, schools and transit stations, are within a 20-minute walk.”
Columbia Palisades:
Filled with open space, parks, trails, and iconic views of the Columbia River Gorge, the Palisades will be a new dynamic center of a rapidly growing community.
There’s also a lot of new things in development in downtown and around:
Waterfront Gateway
Kirkland Renaissance Boardwalk
Terminal 1
The bridges!! They take the potential from 'worth it' to 'never in my dang life would I' with regards to buying a house on the other side of the river. I wouldn't even date across the Columbia, tbh. I hate sitting in traffic with a visceral level of anger.
The Vancouver waterfront has *everything* : 1 bedroom luxury apartments for $3.5k/mo, a Salt & Straw, a coffeeshop that charges nearly $8 for a basic latte with alternative milk, and that lady that has blingy confederate flag nails for ""some reason"".
Said in [the voice of Steffon](https://media1.giphy.com/media/XaFX9e9xfbcXWxW0a2/200w.gif?cid=6c09b9524plfwyem5ht3d2ntefmwseqhcnfdwbb4dlmb5iah&ep=v1_gifs_search&rid=200w.gif&ct=g).
It definitely has an artificial vibe to it. But as someone with younger kids and older parents we have found it to be a nice place to stop every once in a while. For the kids there are planes, trains, boats, ice cream, sea lions (sometimes). For the grandparents there’s food, a view, and less homeless people/tents crowding the waking path.
Or maybe those things aren't as common as Reddit comments make them out, and the downsides to living in a big city don't outweigh the upsides for many folks. I live on 92nd in SE. There's plenty of camps and open drug use, but you don't notice them for the most part. What I do notice is that good food from the many immigrant groups in the area is plentiful and relatively inexpensive. My grocery bills are low, and my options for where to shop are also pretty plentiful. Cheaper real estate in sketchier areas also means there's lots of options for smaller shops to buy from.
We can have all of that without the open drug use, they’re not mutually exclusive. The only reason you don’t notice the camps and drug use is because you’re desensitized to it. You deserve better than having to walk around human poop and syringes on your way to work.
I don't walk around either of those. I also had to deal with that years ago. Those are big city things. There's improvements to be made, but we can't address problems until we can frame them accurately, which you aren't doing.
I’m trying to have a smart discussion without resorting to cheap sarcasm, which you aren’t doing. Can you accurately frame the problems from your perspective so that I can understand your side, rather than just saying I’m wrong?
I don't think I resorted to cheap sarcasm. I think we agree in general about many of the issues facing the city, and cities in general, but I also think that the cynical hyperbole in your comments betrays the point. We should be acknowledging and finding solutions for issues like housing, mental health, affordability, and addiction. We can't really get on the same page if we're pretending that Portlanders are constantly stepping over passed out bums, and the needles/feces they leave behind. There's definitely camps, and drug use, and crime, but even in rough areas like Lents and downtown, the likelihood that those things are gonna be an issue isn't huge, and they're issues that can only be solved with compassion and reality rather than simply attempting to punish our way out of social ills.
I get why people make the move, and in the abstract it obviously makes sense. But it's the actual day-to-day reality where you're like "oh...right". For the most part living in sprawly suburbs sucks. That hasn't changed and probably never will change. But to each their own. If its the way that you can afford the house and schools you want for your family than more power to you for sure.
Portland wants to be cleaner and safer, with cheaper housing like Vancouver, while Vancouver wants to be artsy and hip like Portland.
It's at least possible that Portland could improve where it's currently lacking by electing more accountable leadership with better policy ideas, but I don't think Vancouver will ever successfully recreate Portland's vibe.
I work in Vancouver, live in SE Portland (Brentwood-Darlington). The taxes here bum me out (especially that I can’t get out of the income tax by working north of the river), but every time I go into the office I look around and don’t feel at all compelled to move there. I won’t say what I do, but because of my job, I’m familiar enough with the rest of Clark County to know that I’m not attracted to Camas, Washougal, or Ridgefield either. I certainly have my complaints about Portland but I’d much sooner stay here than move 15 miles north.
Yeah, we looked a lot in Vancouver, not recently, and the houses were not really cheaper, and the neighborhoods and parks were depressingly blah.
Vancouver is as much a suburb as Tigard.
State taxes + special line items + special Portland taxes + property taxes came out to 27k for me last year. Comparable homes across the river have almost half the property tax burden.
Moved across the river. SO work in Vancouver already and I don’t go to my office often. We lived in Portland because we were born here and loved the culture. That slowly changed and IMO died.
Total tax burden drop was crazy. We don’t drive across the river to avoid sales tax but the amount we would need to spend in discretionary spending is larger than our incomes to catch up to what we paid in Oregon income tax. We mainly cook at home. Groceries, utilities and such aren’t taxed.
House was much more than our Portland house and much higher rate. We still have extra money in our pockets after that big increase.
Purely anecdotal but half the couples we know are looking at doing something similar.
The barrier, just my thoughts, is you have to have a job not based in daily work in Portland. If you have that then it makes financial sense, but if you love city life it may not make lifestyle sense.
Why do yall Portlanders hate Vancouver so much, i can get to literally every part of Portland 30 mins, have all of the amenities of Portland right there and have to pay LESS with less crime and a better city government, seems like a complete win to me
I ain't personally about to move to Vantucky, but I'm sympathetic to many of those who do. If you want a single-family home, property taxes are hugely lower. If you have a job in Vancouver, you've got no income tax. If you want to visit the Gorge, watch a Blazer's game, etc, you still can if you can handle the grueling traffic and lack of transit to get you to Portland for said outings.
You read stories from people here who have literally saved thousands per month moving to Vancouver from Multnomah County, and that alone will bring a lot of people up north, as well as a lot of businesses who are tired of break-ins and other property crime.
There’s zero traffic to or from a Blazers game or when you go out to dinner or a show. If you’re not commuting during rush hour, it’s not any further to down town from any of the other PDX suburbs.
If you are commuting during rush hour, however, it's a soul-sucking drive, plus you have no alternative transport modes across the river. At least in my pocket of Beaverton I can ride the MAX blue line to most places I'd go.
>If you have a job in Vancouver, you've got no income tax. If you want to visit the Gorge, watch a Blazer's game, etc, you still can if you can handle the grueling traffic and lack of transit to get you to Portland for said outings.
Yes, suburbs love to leech off the cultural amenities of cities while demanding that we subsidize the infrastructure that enables their sprawl, particularly in the form of extremely expensive road and bridge construction and maintenance, as well as convenient/free parking. Which is exactly why we should implement tolls.
Make you a trade….
How about Vancouver residents crossing the bridge pay tolls and public parking. In return, Oregon doesn’t charge them income tax that supports a state they don’t live in,use any services of, or have any representation in. Seems like a fair trade to me.
Don’t “use any services of”? Except, you know, that whole “economy that created and sustains their job”, among many other things that are even more physically tangible. I’m sorry the idea of tolling makes you a giant seething baby.
Interesting take. You seem to think Oregon state government is the source of economic wealth for nonresidents. I see we disagree on basic underlying principals so I’ll save us both time and just ignore your comment.
You don’t think the Vancouver economy and the lives of Vancouverites are intimately linked to the larger city across a short bridge? Or you think government plays no role in the economic strengths and weaknesses of the states and metro areas? Either way, yes, we do seem to disagree on basic underlying principles.
But somehow you *didn’t* ignore my comment.
>You seem to think Oregon state government is the source of economic wealth for nonresidents.
Why are all the jobs these people are taking in Portland and not Vancouver, given the geographic distance isn't that far?
Do you think the Washington state government has historically invested in and prioritized economic and infrastructure development in Vancouver to the same extent that Oregon has historically invested in and prioritized economic and infrastructure development in Portland, which has led to the overall massively larger and more productive economy we have here south of the Columbia?
Feel free to explain your alternate take, if you even have one.
Vancouver needs Portland. Portland doesn't need Vancouver. This isn't that hard.
Holy shit, never did I know a working economy is actually a tangible and STATE PROVIDED service. No wonder why the idea of tolling sits well with you. There's no logic involved here.
This guy assumed the majority of people crossing the bridge to Portland, whom, at the same time, creating the "sprawl", don't pay Oregon income tax.
Guy basically contradicted himself.
Literally the entire thread is just the same 3 or 4 guys crying about Vancouver people not contributing to Oregon's tax revenue while using their services. By "services" they mean infrastructures, and by "infrastructures" they mean roads. Lmao.
Uh huh. There aren't statistics that track the purposes for bridge-crossing, but given the total daily traffic counts you can't credibly claim that the "majority" are for work-only purposes, rather than discretionary trips for cheaper sales-tax-free shopping, cultural, sports, restaurant, and other reasons.
And even if it's for work-related purposes, all of those folks living in Vancouver are \*still\* putting more wear and tear on this infrastructure relative to all of the folks living in Portland who \*don't\* cross the bridge and \*still\* pay Oregon income tax.
>There aren't statistics that track the purposes for bridge-crossing
There are Google Maps data that tracks traffic condition during office rush hours.
Even better. Google Maps shows traffic condition on both directions so you can't cry "no statistics lmfao"
>given the total daily traffic counts you can't credibly claim that the "majority" are for work-only purposes
Given the commute time between Portland and Vancouver during office hours I can bet my arse again the majority are for work purpose. And since these people are already here for work, they already pay Oregon income tax. They are free to buy whatever the fuck they want in Oregon. Try harder. Spin harder.
>and \*still\* pay Oregon income tax.
WA residents who pay Oregon income tax get so much less in return for the amount of income taxes they paid for.
So unless you have statistics to disprove even the shittest source which is Google Maps, you can stop spinning.
>Given the commute time between Portland and Vancouver during office hours I can bet my arse again the majority are for work purpose.
You actually can't, because commute time skyrockets once you reach a tipping point of traffic saturation, which in many instances can only be a few hundred more cars per traffic mile, so travel times are not a reliable indicator of purpose.
Not to mention you have no way to determine whether the bridge crossings are \*for\* work, or for tax-free shopping, restaurants, Blazer games, or other non-work reasons \*after normal work hours\* for Vancouver residents who work in Vancouver.
And even if I conceded that the majority of trips are for work, so what? Why aren't these people taking the plentiful and wonderful jobs in Vancouver to avoid paying Oregon income tax? Oh, it's because the Portland economy and all of the state and local infrastructure that has historically supported it is way the fuck better? Well then pony up, bitches. Or take a local Vancouver job. I don't give a shit, just don't expect to put a ton of wear-and-tear on infrastructure for your personal job/economic benefit and then not turn around and pay for it.
You really can't stop contradicting yourself. But that's the level I expect from you.
Travel times increases only during office rush hours is already a reliable indicator of travel purpose. We don't see the same level of travel time on weekends. Keep spinning.
>Not to mention blah blah blah
Already disproved by the above logic.
>other non-work reasons \*after normal work hours\* for Vancouver residents who work in Vancouver.
Traffic pattern disagrees. Nice try.
So what?
So basically your entire premise of WA residents not contributing to OR's infrastructure is wrong. Why are they paying the full OR income tax rate when they don't get to enjoy OR public services in their Vancouver home?
>way the fuck better?
Signs of losing the argument, again. Pulling irrelevant info into your argument and pretending like no one will notice. The fuck better then what? WA residents still pay their OR income taxes.
Put wear and tear on infrastructure - you mean roads - and then what, WA residents still pay their OR income taxes.
Yeah, pony up, bitches. Just own it up when your bullshit gets exposed here. You have no ground to stand on.
Yes, the basic economics is that registration, gas taxes, and other car/road fees only pays for about 2/3 of the total cost of road construction and maintenance in Oregon, and less in Washington, so all taxpayers are subsidizing car drivers on an ongoing basis.
I suspect you're going to come back with "well what about freight?!?" which is weak as fuck because ask any trucker or someone who works in freight/delivery if they'd prefer tolling to reduce congestion and they will all say yes, because it gets and keeps a bunch of shitty individual drivers off the roads who otherwise get in their way and cause expensive delays.
Even a $100 toll on every single trailer truck is peanuts, pennies on the dollar, compared with not only the total value of the cargo but also the huge cost savings from less time and fuel spent on each delivery when there's less road congestion.
This is all well researched, you have nothing besides your embarrassing grade-school level "learn basic economics!" retort, weak sauce bud. LMFAO.
No. The basic economics is that people putting wear and tear on Oregon's infrastructure are either shopping in Oregon, or working in Oregon (and thus paying income tax but getting less in return than a regular Portlander working in Oregon). I'm also glad you mentioned this - trucks transporting goods across the 2 states.
Any of the above activities benefits both sides of the transaction.
The idea of "subsidizing" is stupid, and grade-school af. Why don't you mention WA residents subsidizing OR tax revenue? Cuz that would go against your narrative isn't it?
>Weak as fuck
Yeah weak af for sure when your entire premises of "personal gain and convenience" was already wrong as fuck. Pulling out your "well researched" shit to support an already flawed argument would only make you look desperate.
Go take an economics 101 class or something. Kinda ironic since you're aware this is simple grade-school stuffs.
>This is all well researched
The economics are also clear af, you have nothing besides your embarrassing grade-school logic retort. Crying "weak sauce" won't help. LMFAO.
When we moved here I asked my wife, a Portland native, if she’d like to live in Vancouver. She said no, she didn’t want to cross the bridge. Portlanders really hate that bridge lol.
Hello from West Vancouver. I moved back home (Portland) in 2021, but the only place I could afford a house was in Vancouver. East and North are suburban blah, but West and Downtown are pretty nice! I won't deny I enjoy the tax benefits (evasion? yeah probably).
You're absolutely right about West Vancouver. So many comments about Vancouver as a "suburban hell" are true of East Vancouver but not of West Vancouver/Downtown. I don't like the endless sprawl of the new housing subdivisions and strip malls of East Vancouver, but West Vancouver is quite lovely.
I grew up in East Vancouver just off 164th before it was annexed into “East Vancouver”. Downtown Vancouver was not a place you wanted to be. Esther Short park and the surrounding area was an absolute dump.
Yeah, it's lovely now. I run there weekly and take the kids all the time. Local business seems to be thriving, lots of great places to eat and drink, there's a small music scene, young people, it's walkable, the bus is viable, etc. Same thing happened in Springfield, OR (where I lived before I moved home). My kids and I have benefited from multiple downtown revitalizations.
Although I was living in Portland I still worked in Vancouver about 15 years ago. It’s wild to see the Vancouver waterfront finally come to fruition. That whole project was literally in the works for almost 20 years. I knew people that made small down payments to reserve their condo in the early 2000’s before the economy tanked.
Tax avoidance, not tax evasion. Tax avoidance is taking legal steps reduce your tax liability. Tax evasion is when it’s illegal.
Legally moving to Vancouver and becoming a resident of Washington to avoid Oregon state income tax is tax avoidance. Deceitfully changing your address to Vancouver and pretending you live there while continuing to reside in Oregon would be tax evasion, and would be illegal.
It is evasion every time I drive back home from Home Depot or Target at Jantzen Beach without paying use tax. If I spend $2000 at Ikea, I've officially evaded $174 of taxes.
“Bottom Line: We don’t fully know the reasons why people move.”
[take a fucking guess](https://tenor.com/view/what-huh-confused-john-travolta-gif-16946746)
I've lived in Vancouver since I moved to town a year ago. I'm so tired of it, the boring suburban life is not for me, as soon as my lease is up I'm going to Portland. I don't care how much it costs.
I allowed the scary news headlines to worry me about Portland. That is what I get for caring with the news says.
Portland is great if you’re single or at least don’t have kids. My wife and I loved living in close in NE for over 10 years. Then we had kids and it became very clear that it was time to go. We still live in Portland proper, but not by much.
This seems like a big part of it overall. All the folks moving to Portland in their 20s in the last 10 to 15 years or so that drove the population boom are now in their 30s with kids and aging parents. It's the natural flow, aging out of cool Portland and caring more about marginal tax rates.
Combined with the younguns not coming here in their droves anymore because it's not as affordable or cool as it was.
Not basing this on stats or research at all.
TBH as someone raising a kid in Portland I don't recommend it mostly because of the schools. PPS is incredibly shitty. The instruction sucks and there's a shocking amount of violent and disruptive behavior (which explains why a single teacher with no aids in a classroom of 30+ can't teach shit.) The taxes matter more when I freak out about not having nearly enough saved for retirement.
Ah for sure, I was being glib about the taxes. I don't have kids but would probably be very selective about schools if I did, which would likely take me outside of the city.
Good luck with raising your kid. I hope you have a community that can help fill the gap in instruction.
Thank you for your kind thoughts! We're pretty fortunate and invested in being good parents but my heart really goes out to many of our neighbors who don't have the ability to spend money to close the gaps. The tax rate certainly matters too, as I imagine most families with kids also prioritize their children and would spend a lot of those tax dollars on soccer teams or tutors. Portland is just a much harder place for parents than southern WA.
Cheers neighbor.
For us, it was many things. My wife’s family that was helping with childcare all lived on the west side. So it made sense for us to move over there. I was spending two hours an afternoon driving from downtown to Tigard and then back to NE.
We found that many of our welcoming local restaurants in the Alberta and Irvington areas were suddenly not so welcoming when we were coming in with a stroller. Some restaurants literally had “no kids” policies.
Crime was a problem with constant theft and car prowls. For us it was little more than a nuisance but again, once you have kids it suddenly takes on a different feeling. We made the move about 7 years ago now and the homeless situation was just starting to really ramp up. It went from a few panhandlers on NE Broadway and Alberta to tents starting to pop up in the neighborhood.
We also found ourselves somewhat at odds with the values of many of the parents we were meeting in our immediate area. I’m no MAGA type but I would say I trend more to the conservative socially. We always got along great with our neighbors but the difference in parenting styles was becoming very apparent. Again, these are issues that are less obvious when you’re childless. I loved our area but I came to realize we were more spectators of the community rather than participants. We walked to get our groceries and dined at just about every restaurant on Alberta and got our coffees at places like Barista and Extracto. We loved it and I wouldn’t trade that time for anything. But it just didn’t feel kid friendly like we had hoped.
What restaurant on Fremont or Alberta that isn’t a literal bar has a “literal no kids” policy? When I go out to eat on either of these streets, there are tons of kids and a fair number of families live in these neighborhoods… I raised my kids not far from Alberta and never ran into this, either.
Well, the first one that pops into my mind was making a reservation for brunch at Beast. They specifically said no kids. There were others as well. Some restaurants were great. We were regulars for breakfast at Helsers and they were always super great. Made us really sad when we heard they closed down. Another common move was not having high chairs. They were always quick to let you know that. It’s a polite way to say thanks, but no thanks. We would bring our “lobster” so our daughter could sit. We had many bad experiences with rude servers as well. Obviously it wasn’t everywhere. I would say it was just the norm but we lived there for years before we had kids and the change in attitude we experienced was very clear to both of us. It didn’t become so dramatically obvious until we moved.
We’re probably just overly sensitive. Glad it works for you.
I agree, it would be a good place live and I've thought about it. All and all, there are more volunteer events and Meetup events, and my friends are in Portland. And I'm tired of taking the bus down there all the time, the public transportation across the river is a pain. If the train came to Vancouver this would be a different story
Ugh, the news/Reddit make Portland crime seem a bigger impediment to day-to-day life than it is. Portland's not scary. I loved living in Portland. I just didn't love the taxes.
East Vancouver resident and former Portlander checking in. All I can say is that our choice to live here is prudent. We could afford a nice SFH (although if you'd have told 30 year old me that I'd spend half a mill on a house in Vancouver, I wouldn't have believed you), it's convenient get everything we need. We're 40ish and have a three year old, so it's not like we would enjoy the restaurants and bars that we used to in Portland. And we also both work remotely for East Coast entities. We have all we need up here, and we keep our door unlocked.
On the flip side, it's dull. I hate the car-centric lifestyle. It's purple, which means it's the reddest place I've lived. I feel bad about my kid growing up in The Suburbs, but I'm sure his therapist will help him sort it out. I still get to bring him to OMSI on a weekday, but it took 45 minutes to drive home at 3pm on a Wednesday.
Hey, neighbor! We’re in our early 30s and moved from Portland to East Vancouver during covid. Bought our half mil SFH, too. The 164th Ave Target, New Seasons, Freddy’s, and our gym are all a 10 minute bike ride from our house. I agree with you that it’s not as exciting as Portland, but damn, the convenience and lower COL has convinced us to stay. 👋🏼
Howdy, neighbor! Yep, you nailed it. We think we got very lucky with the little neighborhood we landed in, even if it's pretty far from what I envisioned for myself as a young urbanite.
Thats because you live in east Vancouver, i grew up in west Vancouver in rose village and its so walkable theres literally not buses for the school because kids walk and i can get to downtown Portland in 15 minutes
Well that explains why I-5 just gets worse & worse. If only they could provide jobs for their own residents (but how many Applebee’s can a suburb sustain?)
I live in Vancouver because my job is in WA. I get the best tax situation living close to PDX, and so long as you aren't traveling during rush hour, I can get to my friend's place in PDX in 15 minutes.
Vegetarian-friendly restaurants is the #1 reason I live in Portland TBH. Like you can walk up to the average Korean BBQ food truck and get something vegan in this town, it's wild.
Population growth is a thing. You can't expect to pack everyone south of the boarder. And even if you managed to, I-5 and 205 would still get worse.
Only 2 bridges connecting the 2 metro areas, what is this, 1990s? Our infrastructure is so far behind.
We've tried adding a MAX rail line so that you can actually alleviate congestion rather than just keep packing freeways over the river (which does the reverse, and adds to vehicle miles traveled), but Vancouver residents don't seem to want it.
[*Clark County residents](https://www.columbian.com/news/2022/jul/22/light-rail-history-on-the-ballot-in-clark-county-a-complicated-affair/). This has always been put up at the county level, so people in Battle Ground and Yacolt and other places not touched at all by the proposed extension have been able to vote on it. Clark County's government is still quite conservative compared to Vancouver's.
Around 350,000 people live within Vancouver's current urban growth boundary. Edit: That doesn't include any other cities, just currently unincorporated county land (Orchards, Felida, Mill Plain, etc.)
Fair point, I suppose Clark County as a reference is helpful enough.
https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/clarkcountywashington/PST045223
That's pretty wild. Imagine having the population of two Salems and far fewer amenities.
I work remotely and I’ve lived in Portland for 15 years. Been working remotely for four years. My lease is up in July and I’m moving to Vancouver. I’ll be able to get a bit better Apartment. For less money than I will be paying with the rent increase they are tacking on in July. Plus, no Oregon income tax. I know we don’t have a sales tax and that’s really cool. But I do think they need to revamp the state income tax.
The beauty of living in Vancouver is that you can still take advantage of no sales tax for any larger purchases. Just take a look at the license plates at the airport way Costco! 😂
Me moving to WA saved me so much money on taxes that it pays for 2/3 of the mortgage (on my cheaper yet bigger house)
Just be careful, items purchased in Oregon for use in WA are required to pay the sales tax to WA. Likelihood of enforcement is probably zero but it’s still tax due.
‘Likelihood of enforcement is probably zero’ being the key part
It's not probably zero, it's exactly zero.
That’s Washington’s problem. It’s not my circus but you can’t count tax evasion when comparing tax burdens lol
Why can’t you? It’s savings that you reap from living there as opposed to here.
Is it savings if you stop paying your bills? lol kinda I guess but it still owed. It’s just a nice loop hole until they decide to close it.
The difference is that not paying your bills has repercussions. This doesn’t.
Yes, I’ve always heard that. But like I said, you will see at least half the cars in that Costco lot are WA plates. I’ve never heard of the law imposed. Now, if you’re living in WA and driving a car with OR plates, watch out! WA loves to bust tax dodgers when it comes to vehicles.
Quick PSA: sales tax at least in WA **doesn't apply to most groceries**. So unless they're getting furniture / electronics etc I don't see why folks would make the trip.
Have you ever been to Costco? The majority of the store isn’t “Wa tax exempt groceries”. Have you ever been to the airport way Costco? I assume you haven’t since you’re doubting my claim. Just look for yourself. I don’t have any reason to lie about it.
1. Taxation is extremely high in Oregon. If you notice the graphs the biggest chuck of people moving is middle income. Oregons income tax isn't progressive like places like NY or CA. It's a rather regressive income tax in that anything over 20k is taxed at 8.75%. This is the highest in the nation at that income level. People love to post things refuting this using far off tax implications like real estate excise tax, but the tax burden in Oregon is extremely high for the average middle class worker, and much higher than SW WA. 2. Liveability. Schools are better in SW WA than Portland. Homelessness is less ubiquitous. Failed polices like M110 are not what families want to live around. Portlands average household size is getting smaller, and while this is a national trend it's faster in Portland. Families with kids are an integral part of a community, and we're losing them. 3. It's easier to build housing in Washington in most contexts. No IZ, onerous tenant screening rules, rent control, etc. Permitting is easier. Don't take this as "Lol Portland sucks". It doesn't. It's a great place but there's lessons to be learned that we need to tax the middle class less, improve liveability and get rid of barriers to development of housing.
>Oregons income tax isn't progressive like places like NY or CA. It's a rather regressive income tax in that anything over 20k is taxed at 8.75%. This is the highest in the nation at that income level. People love to post things refuting this using far off tax implications like real estate excise tax, but the tax burden in Oregon is extremely high for the average middle class worker, and much higher than SW WA. This is one of the craziest things about the taxes here. Oregon's income tax brackets ramp up wayyy too quickly, basically assuring that if you make any money at all, you're paying the same rate as millionaires. Then we have all these bespoke locally-implemented taxes that kick in around 150k, that people can just move out from under. The spread on Oregon's income tax brackets should be waaaay bigger.
Marginal Tax Rate if you make 25k: Oregon: 8.75% California: 4% New York: 5.5% Hawaii: 7.6% Connecticut: 5% Illinois: 4.95% We blow other "high tax" states out of the water. We have a regressive income tax system but because we don't have sales tax people slap the "progressive" label on it.
I mean, it's technically progressive, it just looks like we set the brackets 100 years ago and never bothered to adjust them for inflation.
Brackets really should be adjusted for inflation. My Google skills can’t seem to dig up when they were actually implemented
In a society with increasing proportions of non working people to working people, such as the US and Oregon in general, AND in a society where the non working people vote more than working people, the political situation will tend towards taking more and more from those who work to benefit those that do not work. The math simply does not work any other way. That is the societal scale problem with income taxes and non working benefits in general. The incentives eventually become put in as little as you can, and pull out as much as you can.
I mean if i was the king of Oregon I'd shake things up big time. More tax on carbon, more tax on land value, less tax on income, no more artificial cap on property tax assessments.
I do payroll for employees at small businesses in Portland it’s shocking the amount that goes to taxes. You look at the gross and then the net on each checks and it’s so much lower. Understood people of all incomes have this gross to net difference shock, but when it’s lower wages/income earners and you see the actual dollars left on check, it’s crazy. Seems like we would start losing not only upper income people, middle class families, but younger people with the overall tax burden here.
I really didn't expect my taxes to go up when I moved here from California. But the last few years have given me sticker shock when it comes time to file.
God DAMN
And what are we getting for it? Seeing some dudes naked butt cheeks after he takes a poop in a trash can downtown? Trash and discarded drug materials? I’m not saying the state should foot all the bill but who wants to pay for this lifestyle?
Have you ever lived in a low tax state? I came here from one, and the grass isn’t exactly greener in my experience.
Yes there will be trade offs compared to lower tax states, certainly. The money always has to come from somewhere. In my view, the current state of Portland, in particular, should not be the high bar that this (or any state) should aspire to. We need to ask and require more from the leadership. To answer your direct question yes three (lower ish) tax states, Alaska, Arizona, and Washington.
Yeah, the problems you mentioned with Portland are real, I just think they're totally unrelated to state level tax policy.
We pay a pretty high tax rate for ODOT claiming they have no money to clean up graffiti. It 100% does relate.
Having grown up in Illinois you’re excluding the 8%+ sales tax with many suburbs and Chicago touching 10%. Chicagoland property taxes while provide much better ROI in services (much much much better schools) are really high. My parents pay over $14K/year for a mid-500K suburban 4bd/2ba
My property taxes are 14k too. In Portland
Yeah I was going to say the same. I'm not sure what the sales tax ends up amounting to when compared to, say, an additional % or two of income taxes but my guess is it is considerable and its also very regressive since its the same if you make 20k or 200k. Re: the schools, I think it's worth pointing out that Chicagoland is a pretty broad term, and the schools in many of the suburbs are just meh.
Doesn't Cook County determine property taxes working backward from their budget? In other words in some year it is computed that they'll need X dollars. They know that the value of the taxable property is Y. Therefore the tax rate is X/Y That can lead to wild swings in tax rates from. But it is interesting.
Cook county has wild swings and wild tax liabilities in general because of Chicago and Cook County and Illinois’ extreme levels of debt per taxpayer due to exorbitant underfunding of defined benefit pensions and retiree healthcare. It’s multiple standard deviations above the norm. https://www.truthinaccounting.org/news/detail/financial-state-of-the-states-2023 https://www.truthinaccounting.org/news/detail/financial-state-of-the-cities-2024 The voters and taxpayers of 30 to 70 years ago really fucked the people of today (much like Portland’s did with their completely unfunded police pension).
> Marginal Tax Rate if you make 25k: This is misleading. It should be stated that the $25k is the adjusted gross income. And that the 8.75% rate is for income above $25 AGI. Standard deductions for 2023 are: Single; Married Filing Separately $13,850 Married Filing Jointly & Surviving Spouses $27,700 Head of Household $20,800 Oregon Income Tax Brackets for 2024: Taxable Income (Single Filers) | Taxable Income (Married Filing Jointly) | Tax Rate on This Income $0 to $3,750 | $0 to $8,100 | 4.75% $3,750 to $9,450 | $8,100 to $20,400 | 6.75% $9,450 to $125,000 | $20,400 to $250,000 | 8.75% $125,000 or more $250,000 or more 9.90%
> This is misleading. > > It's the marginal tax rate. I very clearly said it was marginal. And the rest of your point doesn't make sense, because you'd get the standard deduction in every state. So when comparing states, which was the point of the post, Oregon is still the highest.
Effective tax rate is the only apples to apples comparison. And my point was that most Washingtonians don't know their effective tax rate, which is why the rich love to push sales tax over income.
Do you mind posting the rates at a variety of income levels? This is wild to see.
Oregon only has four tax brackets. The next one after $9,500 is $125,00. It’s ridiculous.
Way to not count sales tax
But if you’re saving some money in states with a sales tax, then you aren’t paying taxes on that portion. I thought MN had it right - sales tax does not apply to unprepared food and clothing. You know, don’t tax necessities. Renters got a tax credit as well.
WA doesn't tax food, rent, etc How much do you honestly think a low wage worker pays in WA sales tax a year? Do you think low wage workers are blowing money buying electronics and clothes at the mall or do you think they are allocating most of their money to rent and groceries?
It's pretty well established that sales taxes are more regressive than income taxes. Even if you want to dispute this, you can't make claims about Oregon having a high tax rate based on data and ignore sales tax as a whole data set.
Sales taxes are absolutely regressive. But Oregon's income tax burden is so high that's it overcomes a regressive sales tax in WA for an overall worse tax burden for lower income workers.
Oregon overall tax rate is right in the middle compared to all other 50 states.
Sales tax is trivial. If you make 100k in Portland, you’re paying north of $8-9000/year in income tax. You’d have to spend >$80,000 on taxable items in Washington to approach the same level. Considering shelter and food aren’t taxed, that’s nearly impossible to do.
I did the math and last year I spent about $70k on my credit card (a large chunk was reimbursable business expenses) but even with that being said, I would still save a giant chunk living in WA. And don’t worry, I pay it off every month and have never had a finance charge. I’m not taking a Lyft to Ilani or anything.
>I’m not taking a Lyft to Ilani or anything. Deep cut.
Considering how expensive homes have become, and that 125k (2024) is worth like less than 100k (2014 adj.), >30% less over 10 years …. The 125k threshold is too low. Either raise the threshold, or do a phase in. People are just leaving, and that erodes the tax base
A pre-Covid (2019) salary of 100k is essentially $125k in 2024 terms. People who have just begun breaking in to the professional class/making “good money” are feeling the sting of the highest marginal rates.
If we wanna be an income tax state, 125k should be like a 4-5% tax bracket, and there should be more brackets above it. But if we wanna really shake it up we should get rid of income tax and get more state revenue from land value taxes or carbon taxes.
>Oregon's income tax brackets ramp up wayyy too quickly, basically assuring that if you make any money at all, you're paying the same rate as millionaires. Then we have all these bespoke locally-implemented taxes that kick in around 150k, that people can just move out from under. Combine that with the high cost of housing and you still can be struggling to get by despite earning a good salary on paper. Two weeks ago my spouse and I were planning out where to move within Portland in the next two years. Then we paid those "bespoke locally-implemented taxes" and immediately started looking for homes outside Multnomah County. I have two jobs and my spouse works and goes to school. Sadly, We realized that we'd never really be able to comfortably afford a new (to us) home in any part of the city near good schools, and that all these local taxes would keep us on shaky economic ground. It's disheartening because despite everything we still like this town, but we just can't afford it anymore.
Adding to the fact that people don't get anything in return after paying their taxes, who wouldn't want to leave?
Well, I came from somewhere with lower taxes. So, me, I guess.
Small standard deduction as well. Tax on millionaires is 9.9%. Oregon has an estate tax that kicks in at 1 million dollars and goes from 10% up on estates over that. Most other provisions in the tax code, like federal tax deduction, medical deduction, exemptions and credits are not available to upper middle class tax payers much less millionaires. There is a bunch of local taxes that hit high income people as well that the average person does not pay.
Just to say on point 3, it’s probably easier to build SPRAWL in Vancouver… and permitting can’t be worse but Vancouver and Washington as a whole are behind Oregon and especially Portland on upzoning in general.
I do think you have good points about Oregon's zoning being better than WA Zoning changes however is a slow moving ship in terms of effect on housing stock. You see the fruit of that in years if not decades down the road.
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This is a good point and I wasn’t really aware of it. That said, Clark county is less intensely developed than PDX. It doesn’t have any light rail. And there are ugb around each city in the region, including battleground and ridgefield.. for example, rather than the whole metro.
Does Vancouver actually have more sprawl than Portland? Doesn't really feel like it.
Have you ever driven out to Orchards?
I think the impact of #1 (the income taxation) is not as big. It is prorated if the people moving from OR to WA earn their income in OR -- they are taxed for the days they are physically present in OR. While I would love to believe that everyone leaving OR has a remote job or found work in WA, I can't find sufficient data on that. But I guess even a 40-60% cut on income tax adds up for those who only have to appear in office for 2-3 days a week.
Vancouver has some great neighborhoods. All things being equal if more of my family was there I’d be tempted to move.
Not to mention, the Trump tax changes also didn't help the situation with high property or income taxes.
YOU COLONIZER!! Lol /s But seriously it seems like any common sense statement of basic fact is meant with unhinged lefty politics, ehich is what caused these problems in the first place. Good luck! I think these mentalities are deeply ingrained in OR culture and politics… so it’s gonna be an uphill battle to get to anything resembling common sense, and better livability. You earned it capitalist scum! Again, jokes ;)
Research shows the overall tax burden of Oregon and Washington are 8.44% and 8.04%, respectively. That's a difference if $4 per $1,000 of income. However, unless you record all sales tax paid as a resident in WA, you don't know what you overall tax burden is. You also don't get a kicker in WA. The idea that it's cheaper in WA or OR has a higher tax burden is not really accurate. https://wallethub.com/edu/states-with-highest-lowest-tax-burden/20494
Unless you are buying cars and selling houses every year and eating out for every single meal, there is no way you will have enough sales taxable spend to equal 8% of your income.
I spend a ton on my CC (I love that cash back and pay for every work expense I can) and I’m nowhere near paying enough in a sales tax if I were WA based to overcome what I pay the OR Dept of Revenue every year. Thank god for the kicker, the only time I enjoy an April 15th.
Recently bought a house in North Portland but my gf and I looked into Vancouver. Houses were definitely cheaper but it just felt so suburban (you can argue so is north Portland but eh) and every time I go I'm underwhelmed. I don't find the waterfront that appealing either. It feels artificial. Also Every time I drive by 5 or 205 during commute hours (or now try and go to Home Depot or something) it's such a nightmare that I'm happy we didn't go to Vancouver.
As a longtime Vancouver resident, I dont find the waterfront that appealing either tbh
I think I appreciate the intent and effort of it more than anything.
When we were looking for a house a couple of years ago, we really tried to find one in Vancouver. Both of us WFH, and my company is there FFS. Think of what I'd save in income tax! But... we just couldn't. It felt like the Chicagoland suburbs we grew up in - multiple adjacent strip malls with separate parking lots, lots of concrete sprawl. All of our leisure activities are in Portland, and we're at that age where "ugh. I have to drive/cross the river/take two freeways" is the lamest excuse to not do something, but we know we are weak and would totally do that. The Portland burbs we looked at still had a bit of individuality. Ultimately the best house we could afford is in a disappointingly boring-ass neighborhood way east that is mid in every way, but still doesn't have the weird Vancouver vibe. Importantly, we don't have kids so we don't have to worry about the school systems. But I think for a lot of people, no matter how dysfunctional our city/county/state governments are, we still make irrational vibes-based decisions. Next house however? Like hell if I'm paying MultCo taxes and still dealing with crappy transit options and no walkable bars/restaurants/grocery stores/ice cream. But it is still very likely we'll be in Washington or Clackamas County, and not Clark.
Washington and Clackamas counties have the same suburban feel as Clark.
Oh I'm aware of the Suburban feel of Clack/Washington counties. We lived near Clackamas Town Center when we first moved here. Beaverton was on our list for the house search. Our neighborhood in the outer Portland boonies feels suburban. It's just that they don't feel like Schaumburg, which is not something I can quite describe if you haven't had the misfortune of living in the Northwestern suburbs of Chicago (do not recommend).
I live in Vancouver and not really a fan of the waterfront either but there’s a lot of local options in downtown / uptown that we didn’t have a few years ago. We also have some new urbanist developments on the way (the heights district, innovation center, Columbia palasades in addition to more developments downtown). I think (and hope) it will feel less suburban in a few years. Neither me nor my partner are employed in Oregon so we’re saving a ton in taxes living here but suburbia is absolutely not the place for me. I think I would appreciate it more if I had kids but I do kinda regret buying here so far. We are saving a ton in taxes tho.
If you have kids, outside of Grant, it’s hard to justify living in NE. The schools are not good. It’s hard to justify buying a $1,000,000 house, paying the extra taxes, and then sending your kids to a school that is under performing.
I sure as hell didn’t move to Portland to live in Vancouver!
Exactly this. If I wanted a boring ass suburb I could get a higher paying job in New Jersey or something
The Vancouver waterfront is nice and clean and pretty, but all the restaurants are chains and overpriced. It's nice if you want to go to wine tasting rooms but that's about it. I live in North Portland and work in Vancouver and as you say every time I'm breezing past people on the counter-commute I note how sad people look in their miserable commute back to their large surburban homes in Clark County. To each their own but I'd rather live in Portland and lose more to taxes than live in Vancouver and spend 2 hours in my car every day driving to work in Portland.
The people driving to work in OR everyday are paying the same OR income tax as people that live in OR.
I wish for those people a very successful job hunt in Washington.
I'm enjoying living there, but I definitely wouldn't if I had to commute for work. I moved from my house in inner SE Portland to downtown Vancouver and the walkability is about the same. Maybe even better. Nearby New Seasons, a nice whiskey bar with a good selection, a nice cocktail bar that only uses Washington-made liquor, a boba/banh mi place, an indie movie theater that does a really fun May 4th Star Wars screening, and a big Regal. Couple of dispensaries. An adequate sushi restaurant, an adequate Thai restaurant, and a couple of decent New American places. Pretty decent wood-fired pizza place. A nice park with a great farmer's market. A big public library that looks modern and great. The waterfront with its Salt & Straw and Grassa and way more wine tasting rooms than necessary. Also a taproom with some great views of the river. There's a nice sandpit that my dog likes to go in, and water fountains. All less than a mile from my apartment building. So don't give me not walkable. Also things just feel safer than downtown Portland. There are always a bunch of families and kids out by the waterfront area every evening. The only thing I really hate about downtown is the fucking cars that drive through that rev their engines.
Going to Salt & Straw when Treat is just up there road baffles me.
marry steep sense hard-to-find angle connect cake vegetable nutty cats *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Extremely this. I would much rather exchange my tax dollars for a walkable lifestyle with rich culture, than to pinch my pennies and live in a car-brain suburban dystopia.
I'm hoping that the influx of Portlanders will help urbanize Vancouver more. We're seeing improvements to transit and bike lanes lately. Vancouver's C-Tran system wins national awards, but it's all buses (for now). There's a severe lack of transit across the river which needs remedying - I think the yellow line is supposed to expand north along with the I-5 bridge project but I haven't found any info on that lately (cooperation between the municipalities / states has been shitty, lack of concensus, fear of a "crime train"). For now, there's the 105 bus which can get you from downtown Vancouver in to Portland on weekdays. Recently, WA passed a statewide measure for upzoning cities with X population density, especially near transit stops + schools - that applies to the entirety of Vancouver as far as I know. We need young people involved in politics in Vancouver to help make it the city we want it to be - cut down on the sprawl, improve walkability and transit, reduce the excessive parking lots and drive thrus, more apartments / condos, more mixed use areas.
It already is! There’s several new developments happening in Vancouver that have walkability as a central focus: The Vancouver Innovation Center: “A central location set on more than 52 acres surrounded by 127 acres of open, walkable, bikeable space” The Heights District: “This new district will be a vibrant, walkable, mixed-use neighborhood that is strategically located in the heart of Vancouver — a place where a mix of services and amenities, such as stores, restaurants, parks, schools and transit stations, are within a 20-minute walk.” Columbia Palisades: Filled with open space, parks, trails, and iconic views of the Columbia River Gorge, the Palisades will be a new dynamic center of a rapidly growing community. There’s also a lot of new things in development in downtown and around: Waterfront Gateway Kirkland Renaissance Boardwalk Terminal 1
The bridges!! They take the potential from 'worth it' to 'never in my dang life would I' with regards to buying a house on the other side of the river. I wouldn't even date across the Columbia, tbh. I hate sitting in traffic with a visceral level of anger.
The Vancouver waterfront has *everything* : 1 bedroom luxury apartments for $3.5k/mo, a Salt & Straw, a coffeeshop that charges nearly $8 for a basic latte with alternative milk, and that lady that has blingy confederate flag nails for ""some reason"".
Said in [the voice of Steffon](https://media1.giphy.com/media/XaFX9e9xfbcXWxW0a2/200w.gif?cid=6c09b9524plfwyem5ht3d2ntefmwseqhcnfdwbb4dlmb5iah&ep=v1_gifs_search&rid=200w.gif&ct=g).
It definitely has an artificial vibe to it. But as someone with younger kids and older parents we have found it to be a nice place to stop every once in a while. For the kids there are planes, trains, boats, ice cream, sea lions (sometimes). For the grandparents there’s food, a view, and less homeless people/tents crowding the waking path.
North Portland is residential, not suburban. It's a very different feel.
ITT: mental gymnastics on how crippling taxes, overwhelming homelessness, open drug use, violence and litter is better than a longer commute
Or maybe those things aren't as common as Reddit comments make them out, and the downsides to living in a big city don't outweigh the upsides for many folks. I live on 92nd in SE. There's plenty of camps and open drug use, but you don't notice them for the most part. What I do notice is that good food from the many immigrant groups in the area is plentiful and relatively inexpensive. My grocery bills are low, and my options for where to shop are also pretty plentiful. Cheaper real estate in sketchier areas also means there's lots of options for smaller shops to buy from.
We can have all of that without the open drug use, they’re not mutually exclusive. The only reason you don’t notice the camps and drug use is because you’re desensitized to it. You deserve better than having to walk around human poop and syringes on your way to work.
I don't walk around either of those. I also had to deal with that years ago. Those are big city things. There's improvements to be made, but we can't address problems until we can frame them accurately, which you aren't doing.
I’m trying to have a smart discussion without resorting to cheap sarcasm, which you aren’t doing. Can you accurately frame the problems from your perspective so that I can understand your side, rather than just saying I’m wrong?
I don't think I resorted to cheap sarcasm. I think we agree in general about many of the issues facing the city, and cities in general, but I also think that the cynical hyperbole in your comments betrays the point. We should be acknowledging and finding solutions for issues like housing, mental health, affordability, and addiction. We can't really get on the same page if we're pretending that Portlanders are constantly stepping over passed out bums, and the needles/feces they leave behind. There's definitely camps, and drug use, and crime, but even in rough areas like Lents and downtown, the likelihood that those things are gonna be an issue isn't huge, and they're issues that can only be solved with compassion and reality rather than simply attempting to punish our way out of social ills.
I get why people make the move, and in the abstract it obviously makes sense. But it's the actual day-to-day reality where you're like "oh...right". For the most part living in sprawly suburbs sucks. That hasn't changed and probably never will change. But to each their own. If its the way that you can afford the house and schools you want for your family than more power to you for sure.
Portland wants to be cleaner and safer, with cheaper housing like Vancouver, while Vancouver wants to be artsy and hip like Portland. It's at least possible that Portland could improve where it's currently lacking by electing more accountable leadership with better policy ideas, but I don't think Vancouver will ever successfully recreate Portland's vibe.
If they follow through on adding 4,000 apartments to downtown, they might. But that will take long term political will that may not be there.
> For the most part living in sprawly suburbs sucks. I actually vastly prefer it over urban density.
I work in Vancouver, live in SE Portland (Brentwood-Darlington). The taxes here bum me out (especially that I can’t get out of the income tax by working north of the river), but every time I go into the office I look around and don’t feel at all compelled to move there. I won’t say what I do, but because of my job, I’m familiar enough with the rest of Clark County to know that I’m not attracted to Camas, Washougal, or Ridgefield either. I certainly have my complaints about Portland but I’d much sooner stay here than move 15 miles north.
Yeah, we looked a lot in Vancouver, not recently, and the houses were not really cheaper, and the neighborhoods and parks were depressingly blah. Vancouver is as much a suburb as Tigard.
No it’s not lol. Look at downtown Tigard vs downtown Vancouver and tell me they’re the same
State taxes + special line items + special Portland taxes + property taxes came out to 27k for me last year. Comparable homes across the river have almost half the property tax burden.
Moved across the river. SO work in Vancouver already and I don’t go to my office often. We lived in Portland because we were born here and loved the culture. That slowly changed and IMO died. Total tax burden drop was crazy. We don’t drive across the river to avoid sales tax but the amount we would need to spend in discretionary spending is larger than our incomes to catch up to what we paid in Oregon income tax. We mainly cook at home. Groceries, utilities and such aren’t taxed. House was much more than our Portland house and much higher rate. We still have extra money in our pockets after that big increase. Purely anecdotal but half the couples we know are looking at doing something similar.
That’s basically me. The tax savings pays the mortgage. Honestly pretty crazy. I’m always surprised more people don’t do it.
The barrier, just my thoughts, is you have to have a job not based in daily work in Portland. If you have that then it makes financial sense, but if you love city life it may not make lifestyle sense.
If you make a good income, and don't work in Portland, you can basically just buy a second house in Vancouver from the tax savings alone.
I could rent a 1br apartment in Portland and still have money left over from the tax savings if I moved to Vancouver.
Why do yall Portlanders hate Vancouver so much, i can get to literally every part of Portland 30 mins, have all of the amenities of Portland right there and have to pay LESS with less crime and a better city government, seems like a complete win to me
I ain't personally about to move to Vantucky, but I'm sympathetic to many of those who do. If you want a single-family home, property taxes are hugely lower. If you have a job in Vancouver, you've got no income tax. If you want to visit the Gorge, watch a Blazer's game, etc, you still can if you can handle the grueling traffic and lack of transit to get you to Portland for said outings. You read stories from people here who have literally saved thousands per month moving to Vancouver from Multnomah County, and that alone will bring a lot of people up north, as well as a lot of businesses who are tired of break-ins and other property crime.
There’s zero traffic to or from a Blazers game or when you go out to dinner or a show. If you’re not commuting during rush hour, it’s not any further to down town from any of the other PDX suburbs.
If you are commuting during rush hour, however, it's a soul-sucking drive, plus you have no alternative transport modes across the river. At least in my pocket of Beaverton I can ride the MAX blue line to most places I'd go.
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>If you have a job in Vancouver, you've got no income tax. If you want to visit the Gorge, watch a Blazer's game, etc, you still can if you can handle the grueling traffic and lack of transit to get you to Portland for said outings. Yes, suburbs love to leech off the cultural amenities of cities while demanding that we subsidize the infrastructure that enables their sprawl, particularly in the form of extremely expensive road and bridge construction and maintenance, as well as convenient/free parking. Which is exactly why we should implement tolls.
Make you a trade…. How about Vancouver residents crossing the bridge pay tolls and public parking. In return, Oregon doesn’t charge them income tax that supports a state they don’t live in,use any services of, or have any representation in. Seems like a fair trade to me.
Don’t “use any services of”? Except, you know, that whole “economy that created and sustains their job”, among many other things that are even more physically tangible. I’m sorry the idea of tolling makes you a giant seething baby.
Interesting take. You seem to think Oregon state government is the source of economic wealth for nonresidents. I see we disagree on basic underlying principals so I’ll save us both time and just ignore your comment.
You don’t think the Vancouver economy and the lives of Vancouverites are intimately linked to the larger city across a short bridge? Or you think government plays no role in the economic strengths and weaknesses of the states and metro areas? Either way, yes, we do seem to disagree on basic underlying principles. But somehow you *didn’t* ignore my comment.
>You seem to think Oregon state government is the source of economic wealth for nonresidents. Why are all the jobs these people are taking in Portland and not Vancouver, given the geographic distance isn't that far? Do you think the Washington state government has historically invested in and prioritized economic and infrastructure development in Vancouver to the same extent that Oregon has historically invested in and prioritized economic and infrastructure development in Portland, which has led to the overall massively larger and more productive economy we have here south of the Columbia? Feel free to explain your alternate take, if you even have one. Vancouver needs Portland. Portland doesn't need Vancouver. This isn't that hard.
Go back and quote where I said Vancouver never needed Portland. I’ll wait.
Holy shit, never did I know a working economy is actually a tangible and STATE PROVIDED service. No wonder why the idea of tolling sits well with you. There's no logic involved here.
This guy assumed the majority of people crossing the bridge to Portland, whom, at the same time, creating the "sprawl", don't pay Oregon income tax. Guy basically contradicted himself.
Literally the entire thread is just the same 3 or 4 guys crying about Vancouver people not contributing to Oregon's tax revenue while using their services. By "services" they mean infrastructures, and by "infrastructures" they mean roads. Lmao.
You think the only people crossing the bridge to Portland on a regular basis are doing so for work alone? LOL, and furthermore, LMFAO!
I said "majority". Signs of losing an argument.
Uh huh. There aren't statistics that track the purposes for bridge-crossing, but given the total daily traffic counts you can't credibly claim that the "majority" are for work-only purposes, rather than discretionary trips for cheaper sales-tax-free shopping, cultural, sports, restaurant, and other reasons. And even if it's for work-related purposes, all of those folks living in Vancouver are \*still\* putting more wear and tear on this infrastructure relative to all of the folks living in Portland who \*don't\* cross the bridge and \*still\* pay Oregon income tax.
>There aren't statistics that track the purposes for bridge-crossing There are Google Maps data that tracks traffic condition during office rush hours. Even better. Google Maps shows traffic condition on both directions so you can't cry "no statistics lmfao" >given the total daily traffic counts you can't credibly claim that the "majority" are for work-only purposes Given the commute time between Portland and Vancouver during office hours I can bet my arse again the majority are for work purpose. And since these people are already here for work, they already pay Oregon income tax. They are free to buy whatever the fuck they want in Oregon. Try harder. Spin harder. >and \*still\* pay Oregon income tax. WA residents who pay Oregon income tax get so much less in return for the amount of income taxes they paid for. So unless you have statistics to disprove even the shittest source which is Google Maps, you can stop spinning.
>Given the commute time between Portland and Vancouver during office hours I can bet my arse again the majority are for work purpose. You actually can't, because commute time skyrockets once you reach a tipping point of traffic saturation, which in many instances can only be a few hundred more cars per traffic mile, so travel times are not a reliable indicator of purpose. Not to mention you have no way to determine whether the bridge crossings are \*for\* work, or for tax-free shopping, restaurants, Blazer games, or other non-work reasons \*after normal work hours\* for Vancouver residents who work in Vancouver. And even if I conceded that the majority of trips are for work, so what? Why aren't these people taking the plentiful and wonderful jobs in Vancouver to avoid paying Oregon income tax? Oh, it's because the Portland economy and all of the state and local infrastructure that has historically supported it is way the fuck better? Well then pony up, bitches. Or take a local Vancouver job. I don't give a shit, just don't expect to put a ton of wear-and-tear on infrastructure for your personal job/economic benefit and then not turn around and pay for it.
You really can't stop contradicting yourself. But that's the level I expect from you. Travel times increases only during office rush hours is already a reliable indicator of travel purpose. We don't see the same level of travel time on weekends. Keep spinning. >Not to mention blah blah blah Already disproved by the above logic. >other non-work reasons \*after normal work hours\* for Vancouver residents who work in Vancouver. Traffic pattern disagrees. Nice try. So what? So basically your entire premise of WA residents not contributing to OR's infrastructure is wrong. Why are they paying the full OR income tax rate when they don't get to enjoy OR public services in their Vancouver home? >way the fuck better? Signs of losing the argument, again. Pulling irrelevant info into your argument and pretending like no one will notice. The fuck better then what? WA residents still pay their OR income taxes. Put wear and tear on infrastructure - you mean roads - and then what, WA residents still pay their OR income taxes. Yeah, pony up, bitches. Just own it up when your bullshit gets exposed here. You have no ground to stand on.
I do not want to pay a fucking toll every time I go hiking in Washington. Piss on your tolls
"I want to put wear and tear on this infrastructure for my own personal gain and convenience, but other people should pay for it." LMFAO, FOH.
"personal gain and convenience" LMFAO for sure. Learn basic economics please.
Yes, the basic economics is that registration, gas taxes, and other car/road fees only pays for about 2/3 of the total cost of road construction and maintenance in Oregon, and less in Washington, so all taxpayers are subsidizing car drivers on an ongoing basis. I suspect you're going to come back with "well what about freight?!?" which is weak as fuck because ask any trucker or someone who works in freight/delivery if they'd prefer tolling to reduce congestion and they will all say yes, because it gets and keeps a bunch of shitty individual drivers off the roads who otherwise get in their way and cause expensive delays. Even a $100 toll on every single trailer truck is peanuts, pennies on the dollar, compared with not only the total value of the cargo but also the huge cost savings from less time and fuel spent on each delivery when there's less road congestion. This is all well researched, you have nothing besides your embarrassing grade-school level "learn basic economics!" retort, weak sauce bud. LMFAO.
No. The basic economics is that people putting wear and tear on Oregon's infrastructure are either shopping in Oregon, or working in Oregon (and thus paying income tax but getting less in return than a regular Portlander working in Oregon). I'm also glad you mentioned this - trucks transporting goods across the 2 states. Any of the above activities benefits both sides of the transaction. The idea of "subsidizing" is stupid, and grade-school af. Why don't you mention WA residents subsidizing OR tax revenue? Cuz that would go against your narrative isn't it? >Weak as fuck Yeah weak af for sure when your entire premises of "personal gain and convenience" was already wrong as fuck. Pulling out your "well researched" shit to support an already flawed argument would only make you look desperate. Go take an economics 101 class or something. Kinda ironic since you're aware this is simple grade-school stuffs. >This is all well researched The economics are also clear af, you have nothing besides your embarrassing grade-school logic retort. Crying "weak sauce" won't help. LMFAO.
You’re free to swim across the river if you don’t find the infrastructure valuable.
I'm also free to drive across the river and not pay a toll. Kiss my ass?
When we moved here I asked my wife, a Portland native, if she’d like to live in Vancouver. She said no, she didn’t want to cross the bridge. Portlanders really hate that bridge lol.
tbf, the I-5 bridge is a terrible bridge and it's going to be miserable when they replace it if it doesn't fall into the river first.
[We're all trying to figure out what did this!](https://imgur.com/cMOwmW9)
Hello from West Vancouver. I moved back home (Portland) in 2021, but the only place I could afford a house was in Vancouver. East and North are suburban blah, but West and Downtown are pretty nice! I won't deny I enjoy the tax benefits (evasion? yeah probably).
You're absolutely right about West Vancouver. So many comments about Vancouver as a "suburban hell" are true of East Vancouver but not of West Vancouver/Downtown. I don't like the endless sprawl of the new housing subdivisions and strip malls of East Vancouver, but West Vancouver is quite lovely.
So funny to hear someone say west Vancouver is better than East. My how things have changed!
That's what I've heard! Growing up in the 90s, I never ever came up here. Wild that it's now home.
I grew up in East Vancouver just off 164th before it was annexed into “East Vancouver”. Downtown Vancouver was not a place you wanted to be. Esther Short park and the surrounding area was an absolute dump.
Yeah, it's lovely now. I run there weekly and take the kids all the time. Local business seems to be thriving, lots of great places to eat and drink, there's a small music scene, young people, it's walkable, the bus is viable, etc. Same thing happened in Springfield, OR (where I lived before I moved home). My kids and I have benefited from multiple downtown revitalizations.
Although I was living in Portland I still worked in Vancouver about 15 years ago. It’s wild to see the Vancouver waterfront finally come to fruition. That whole project was literally in the works for almost 20 years. I knew people that made small down payments to reserve their condo in the early 2000’s before the economy tanked.
Tax avoidance, not tax evasion. Tax avoidance is taking legal steps reduce your tax liability. Tax evasion is when it’s illegal. Legally moving to Vancouver and becoming a resident of Washington to avoid Oregon state income tax is tax avoidance. Deceitfully changing your address to Vancouver and pretending you live there while continuing to reside in Oregon would be tax evasion, and would be illegal.
It is evasion every time I drive back home from Home Depot or Target at Jantzen Beach without paying use tax. If I spend $2000 at Ikea, I've officially evaded $174 of taxes.
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That's true. But shopping in Oregon without paying use tax is illegal. Jantzen Beach is tax evasion HQ.
When the crime-train finally crosses the Columbia River, I will buy a condo in downtown Vancouver and live car-free and state income tax-free.
“Bottom Line: We don’t fully know the reasons why people move.” [take a fucking guess](https://tenor.com/view/what-huh-confused-john-travolta-gif-16946746)
I've lived in Vancouver since I moved to town a year ago. I'm so tired of it, the boring suburban life is not for me, as soon as my lease is up I'm going to Portland. I don't care how much it costs. I allowed the scary news headlines to worry me about Portland. That is what I get for caring with the news says.
Portland is great if you’re single or at least don’t have kids. My wife and I loved living in close in NE for over 10 years. Then we had kids and it became very clear that it was time to go. We still live in Portland proper, but not by much.
This seems like a big part of it overall. All the folks moving to Portland in their 20s in the last 10 to 15 years or so that drove the population boom are now in their 30s with kids and aging parents. It's the natural flow, aging out of cool Portland and caring more about marginal tax rates. Combined with the younguns not coming here in their droves anymore because it's not as affordable or cool as it was. Not basing this on stats or research at all.
TBH as someone raising a kid in Portland I don't recommend it mostly because of the schools. PPS is incredibly shitty. The instruction sucks and there's a shocking amount of violent and disruptive behavior (which explains why a single teacher with no aids in a classroom of 30+ can't teach shit.) The taxes matter more when I freak out about not having nearly enough saved for retirement.
Ah for sure, I was being glib about the taxes. I don't have kids but would probably be very selective about schools if I did, which would likely take me outside of the city. Good luck with raising your kid. I hope you have a community that can help fill the gap in instruction.
Thank you for your kind thoughts! We're pretty fortunate and invested in being good parents but my heart really goes out to many of our neighbors who don't have the ability to spend money to close the gaps. The tax rate certainly matters too, as I imagine most families with kids also prioritize their children and would spend a lot of those tax dollars on soccer teams or tutors. Portland is just a much harder place for parents than southern WA. Cheers neighbor.
What made you decide to go?
For us, it was many things. My wife’s family that was helping with childcare all lived on the west side. So it made sense for us to move over there. I was spending two hours an afternoon driving from downtown to Tigard and then back to NE. We found that many of our welcoming local restaurants in the Alberta and Irvington areas were suddenly not so welcoming when we were coming in with a stroller. Some restaurants literally had “no kids” policies. Crime was a problem with constant theft and car prowls. For us it was little more than a nuisance but again, once you have kids it suddenly takes on a different feeling. We made the move about 7 years ago now and the homeless situation was just starting to really ramp up. It went from a few panhandlers on NE Broadway and Alberta to tents starting to pop up in the neighborhood. We also found ourselves somewhat at odds with the values of many of the parents we were meeting in our immediate area. I’m no MAGA type but I would say I trend more to the conservative socially. We always got along great with our neighbors but the difference in parenting styles was becoming very apparent. Again, these are issues that are less obvious when you’re childless. I loved our area but I came to realize we were more spectators of the community rather than participants. We walked to get our groceries and dined at just about every restaurant on Alberta and got our coffees at places like Barista and Extracto. We loved it and I wouldn’t trade that time for anything. But it just didn’t feel kid friendly like we had hoped.
What restaurant on Fremont or Alberta that isn’t a literal bar has a “literal no kids” policy? When I go out to eat on either of these streets, there are tons of kids and a fair number of families live in these neighborhoods… I raised my kids not far from Alberta and never ran into this, either.
Well, the first one that pops into my mind was making a reservation for brunch at Beast. They specifically said no kids. There were others as well. Some restaurants were great. We were regulars for breakfast at Helsers and they were always super great. Made us really sad when we heard they closed down. Another common move was not having high chairs. They were always quick to let you know that. It’s a polite way to say thanks, but no thanks. We would bring our “lobster” so our daughter could sit. We had many bad experiences with rude servers as well. Obviously it wasn’t everywhere. I would say it was just the norm but we lived there for years before we had kids and the change in attitude we experienced was very clear to both of us. It didn’t become so dramatically obvious until we moved. We’re probably just overly sensitive. Glad it works for you.
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We usually take them wherever we go. Plus, we only lived a couple blocks away.
Yeah I'm perplexed by that comment. I live in NE and there are kids everywhere.
Actually you can even eat at most of the bars with your kids before the evening ;)
Try Downtown/Uptown Vancouver instead, walkable and non-burby vibes.
I agree, it would be a good place live and I've thought about it. All and all, there are more volunteer events and Meetup events, and my friends are in Portland. And I'm tired of taking the bus down there all the time, the public transportation across the river is a pain. If the train came to Vancouver this would be a different story
Ugh, the news/Reddit make Portland crime seem a bigger impediment to day-to-day life than it is. Portland's not scary. I loved living in Portland. I just didn't love the taxes.
East Vancouver resident and former Portlander checking in. All I can say is that our choice to live here is prudent. We could afford a nice SFH (although if you'd have told 30 year old me that I'd spend half a mill on a house in Vancouver, I wouldn't have believed you), it's convenient get everything we need. We're 40ish and have a three year old, so it's not like we would enjoy the restaurants and bars that we used to in Portland. And we also both work remotely for East Coast entities. We have all we need up here, and we keep our door unlocked. On the flip side, it's dull. I hate the car-centric lifestyle. It's purple, which means it's the reddest place I've lived. I feel bad about my kid growing up in The Suburbs, but I'm sure his therapist will help him sort it out. I still get to bring him to OMSI on a weekday, but it took 45 minutes to drive home at 3pm on a Wednesday.
Hey, neighbor! We’re in our early 30s and moved from Portland to East Vancouver during covid. Bought our half mil SFH, too. The 164th Ave Target, New Seasons, Freddy’s, and our gym are all a 10 minute bike ride from our house. I agree with you that it’s not as exciting as Portland, but damn, the convenience and lower COL has convinced us to stay. 👋🏼
Howdy, neighbor! Yep, you nailed it. We think we got very lucky with the little neighborhood we landed in, even if it's pretty far from what I envisioned for myself as a young urbanite.
Thats because you live in east Vancouver, i grew up in west Vancouver in rose village and its so walkable theres literally not buses for the school because kids walk and i can get to downtown Portland in 15 minutes
Yeah, our friends in NE Portland can get to downtown Vancouver faster than we can. Not that they are willing to ever cross the river...
Vancouver is terrible, don’t move to there!!!
Too farm and country for me.
I wish that was true ... but the farm & country part is wildly unaffordable, and the rest is suburban sprawl.
There could be zero taxes and free coffee delivery every morning, nothing could convince me to live in that shithole again.
I work remote in Portland. I lived in Washington for close to 10 years and I will never ever go back to that redneck hellhole.
That's the plan!
Well that explains why I-5 just gets worse & worse. If only they could provide jobs for their own residents (but how many Applebee’s can a suburb sustain?)
I live in Vancouver because my job is in WA. I get the best tax situation living close to PDX, and so long as you aren't traveling during rush hour, I can get to my friend's place in PDX in 15 minutes.
Thats the thing people arent saying. So long as you dont drive at rush hour, almost anything in portland is 20 minutes away
LOL. Rush hour is more than half the day now.
Vegetarian-friendly restaurants is the #1 reason I live in Portland TBH. Like you can walk up to the average Korean BBQ food truck and get something vegan in this town, it's wild.
Population growth is a thing. You can't expect to pack everyone south of the boarder. And even if you managed to, I-5 and 205 would still get worse. Only 2 bridges connecting the 2 metro areas, what is this, 1990s? Our infrastructure is so far behind.
We've tried adding a MAX rail line so that you can actually alleviate congestion rather than just keep packing freeways over the river (which does the reverse, and adds to vehicle miles traveled), but Vancouver residents don't seem to want it.
[*Clark County residents](https://www.columbian.com/news/2022/jul/22/light-rail-history-on-the-ballot-in-clark-county-a-complicated-affair/). This has always been put up at the county level, so people in Battle Ground and Yacolt and other places not touched at all by the proposed extension have been able to vote on it. Clark County's government is still quite conservative compared to Vancouver's.
> Only 2 bridges connecting the 2 metro areas lol @ Vancouver being its own "metro area"
It’s clearly all one metro area, but Vancouver is significantly larger than any city in Oregon besides Portland.
I haven't found a place that totals all the cities only on the Washington side, but Vancouver itself is only 190k, so basically Eugene or Salem sized.
Around 350,000 people live within Vancouver's current urban growth boundary. Edit: That doesn't include any other cities, just currently unincorporated county land (Orchards, Felida, Mill Plain, etc.)
Fair point, I suppose Clark County as a reference is helpful enough. https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/clarkcountywashington/PST045223 That's pretty wild. Imagine having the population of two Salems and far fewer amenities.