Steve Forbes of Forbes magazine and flat-tax fame tells it like it is during a stop in Charlotte last night:

If I might make a suggestion for the great state of North Carolina, it would be about taxes. It has one of the (highest) tax rates in the Southeast. What’s helped keep the economy going as well as it has is it has a great quality of life and great universities. But that’s not going to get around the tax disadvantage… Even a state like Rhode Island, which is very Democratic, very liberal, they enacted a state version of the flat tax. So North Carolina should do that.

Add in the fact that Char-Meck has — by far — the highest tax bite in North Carolina and you just cannot escape the conclusion that a fiscal train wreck is coming — and soon.