As a brief refresher on how the last temporary tax hike left us with a permanently higher sales tax rate, I direct your attention to the following.

2001: JLF Spotlight expects temporary or permanent tax hikes. Budget includes ?temporary? half-cent sales tax hike and 8.25% income tax rate.

2002: John Hood warns twice not to be fooled that the temporary taxes will end in 2003.

2003: Tax hikes renewed until 2005. Donna Martinez reports on other taxes adding to the burden.

2004: Paul Chesser notes that temporary money keeps coming back. Donna Martinez sees local governments get in the “temporary” game. John Hood sees the problem of financing government growth with temporary taxes. Gov. Easley counts it all as just one tax hike.

2005: Paul Chesser again sees Gov. Easley extend the temporary sales and income taxes.

2006: Chad Adams comments on Gov. Easley?s continuation of some temporary taxes despite a $2.4 billion surplus. Civitas Institute polling shows 48 percent of voters would be less likely to support a candidate who voted to continue the temporary taxes.

2007: With the final quarter-cent of sales tax set to expire, Gov. Easley balks in favor of even bigger government and taxpayers face a potential billion-dollar tax hike. Paul Chesser finds a column from the Chapel Hill News in 2002 titled “Tax Lies” as the temporary sales tax is set to become officially permanent. In three Civitas polls, 75 percent of voters consistently oppose the temporary tax or say it should expire.

2009: As expected, Gov. Perdue says we can trust her to keep new temporary taxes temporary because she?s the governor, even though she was the lieutenant governor through all of the last eight years and most of the legislators are the same, too.

HT: Jacob for digging through the archives.