RALEIGH, N.C. (WNCN) – When people move, they typically do three things – They buy a house, they make purchases, and they pay income tax.
Apple employees will be no exception.
“That’s going to create the ability to invest in education, to invest in health care, to invest in worker training, to invest in broadband, to invest in a range of things that can help people who don’t directly benefit from this project,” said Patrick McHugh, the research manager for the NC Justice Center’s Budget and Tax Center.
Apple announced it will build its first East Coast headquarters in Wake County, bringing in 3,000 jobs with it.
Property tax goes to local governments and sales tax is split up with all 100 counties on a per capita basis.
This helps to pay for things like education, infrastructure, and parks.
“And so some of that tax revenue will actually end up directly benefiting other counties because it will increase overall sales tax collections for the state,” said McHugh.
Apple’s new campus is expected to be a million square feet on a plot of land in Research Triangle Park by NC-540.
How big is that?
The average Wal-Mart Super Center is 180,000-square feet.
So just more than five Walmarts make up the Apple space which will house 3,0000 workers.
According to Wake County Economic Development, nearby IBM has 8,000 employees.
And tech companies Cisco and SAS each have more than 5,000.
Apple may not be as large but is still significant.
But, Mchugh said there’s no guarantee the public’s wish list will be granted.
“We’ve often seen the General Assembly choose to drive revenue into tax cuts for wealthy corporations and rich people instead of the types of investments that will allow more people to benefit from a project of this type.”
McHugh also notes that North Carolina’s state income tax is a flat rate of 5.25 percent.
So high-income earners pay the same rate as low-wage workers.
Apple employees will make an average salary of $187,000 a year.
Major employers in Wake County
| Duke University and Duke Health Systems | 41,206 |
| State of North Carolina | 24,083 |
| Wake County Public School System | 17,000 |
| Wal-Mart | 16,200 |
| University of North Carolina At Chapel Hill | 12,204 |
| WakeMed Health & Hospitals | 9,773 |
| North Carolina State University | 9,019 |
| Food Lion | 8,600 |
| Target Stores | 8,000 |
| IBM (International Business Machines) | 8,000 |
| UNC Rex Healthcare System | 6,900 |
| SAS Institute, Inc. | 5,567 |
| Harris Teeter | 5,346 |
| Cisco Systems | 5,000 |
| IQVIA | 4,570 |