With the dust settling after the debt ceiling fight, Republicans-along with a few Democrats-are moving on to their next agenda item: blocking states from collecting millions in much-needed tax revenue from corporations.

The Business Activity Tax Simplification Act, or BATSA, passed out of the House Judiciary Committee in early July and is set to be taken up by the full House when Congress returns from its August recess. The bill, which is sponsored by Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), would forbid state and local governments in the 44 states that collect corporate income taxes from taxing a sizable chunk of corporate profits. How sizable? The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, which scored a previous version of the bill in 2006, estimated that state revenue losses would explode to $3 billion annually within five years of enactment. Michael Mazerov, a senior fellow at the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, says BATSA’s current incarnation protects an even larger portion of corporate profits than the earlier bill, so state revenue losses could be even higher than the CBO projected. And here’s the kicker: since no federal revenue is lost in the process, it’s no skin off the backs of lawmakers in Washington.

The basic theory behind […]