I frequently shop at Bartell Drug Co. more than any other drug store. It's locally run, it has a homey feel to it, good deals and friendly employees. 

This may all come to an end if Washington State passes I-1098, which would establish a state income tax "for the wealthy."

In a recent Seattle Times editorial, George Bartell notes how having to pay this tax would dip into the funds he would use to pay his 1700 employees and could eventually mean the end of the company because its competition -- namely major corporations like Walmart -- wouldn't be affected by this state law. 

Probably it wasn't the sponsors' intention to favor one group of companies over another. But they are activists. They are not sympathetic to business and don't understand it very well. I-1098 is the result.

...[George Bartell] does not fit the image of a fat cat. He does not have a fancy office in some Bartell skyscraper. He works in a two-story building in the Duwamish industrial district on the edge of a railroad yard.

"We put our money in the stores," he says. It is what a good retailer does. But it is more difficult to do that if you pay a 9 percent tax that your major competitors don't.

Bartell likens it to running a marathon in which the hometown boy has to wear lead shoes.

"It threatens our long-term viability," he says. It could even force the family to sell the century-old chain — the largest independent drug chain here — to an out-of-state buyer, though Bartell says he doesn't want to think about it.

Read the rest of the article here.