McFreedom

Yahoo! has an AP story about Bethany Oklahoma's attempts to get shoppers to stay in town. The problem, of course, is sales tax revenue. Neighboring Oklahoma City and Warr Acres get $455 and $300 per capita annually in sales tax, while poor Bethany only gets $185.

The city leaders figured the problem was that loyal Bethany residents didn't know exactly where the town boundaries were, and were inadvertently shopping in nearby towns by accident. So, they painted a blue line around the city.

After going on for about half the story about blue lines, and the program, etc., they mention, as an aside:

Bethany's city sales tax is 4 percent, compared with 2.5 percent in Warr Acres.

While they don't mention Oklahoma City's tax rates, if the tax rate in Bethany is 63% higher than in Warr Acres, I can bet you the residents of Bethany don't need a blue line. They already know where the lower taxes are. Warr Acres, for its part, has posted signs on their side of the line that say, "Warning: Higher Taxes Ahead." At least somebody gets it.