I'm not sure that ultimately the issue at the heart of the matter is whether or not intellectual work should be taxed the same way manufacturing work is (though that plays into it).
At the heart of the matter is the fact that the government (whether city, county, state, or federal) is expected to provide certain services and needs to pay for them. The government needs to create and maintain roads so people can get to work. Since Seattle has the 2nd worst traffic in the country it also needs to provide public transit or keep building more and more roads. It needs to provide education for all of those people who are going to grow up and write software. It needs to provide emergency services so those employees and executives don't die in a fire or a car wreck. Etc. Etc.
So how does it pay for them? Of course, everyone wants someone ELSE to pay. They can have a flat sales tax on anything sold in the city (or King County, or WA, or the US). They can really highly tax certain types of items (booze, cigarettes). They can tax individual's incomes. They can tax corporate profits. Et cetera, et cetera.
With the Seattle economy being what it is, it seems that some folks have decided that taxing software is a necessity, or the city will deteriorate so much that it will be impossible for those software companies to run in this town anyway (especially with the loss of Boeing and the shipping industry in decline).
Now this doesn't necessarily mean that I agree 100%, or that I'm some huge big-government fanatic, but I think the basic economic realities have to be understood before folks start flinging out dogma.
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I'm not sure that ultimately the issue at the heart of the matter is whether or not intellectual work should be taxed the same way manufacturing work is (though that plays into it). At the heart of the matter is the fact that the government (whether city, county, state, or federal) is expected to provide certain services and needs to pay for them. The government needs to create and maintain roads so people can get to work. Since Seattle has the 2nd worst traffic in the country it also needs to provide public transit or keep building more and more roads. It needs to provide education for all of those people who are going to grow up and write software. It needs to provide emergency services so those employees and executives don't die in a fire or a car wreck. Etc. Etc. So how does it pay for them? Of course, everyone wants someone ELSE to pay. They can have a flat sales tax on anything sold in the city (or King County, or WA, or the US). They can really highly tax certain types of items (booze, cigarettes). They can tax individual's incomes. They can tax corporate profits. Et cetera, et cetera. With the Seattle economy being what it is, it seems that some folks have decided that taxing software is a necessity, or the city will deteriorate so much that it will be impossible for those software companies to run in this town anyway (especially with the loss of Boeing and the shipping industry in decline). Now this doesn't necessarily mean that I agree 100%, or that I'm some huge big-government fanatic, but I think the basic economic realities have to be understood before folks start flinging out dogma.