Every state and nation spends millions and billions to attract technology companies to their jurisdictions, hoping to gain the benefits of their smart and high-wage workforce, their clean and green presence and the large private investments they make to sustain the companies once they are landed.

Everyone wants tech.

That's why it is so shocking that certain Pennsylvania officials want to tax computer services and cell phones.

Such a move eradicates common sense.

Last year, Maryland enacted a computer services tax. Before the tax could be implemented, Maryland lost so many tech companies to Delaware, Pennsylvania and Virginia, the dumb tax was repealed.Taxing and therefore slowing industry sectors that drive economic prosperity is dumb, and it kills the golden goose.

First, tech companies will leave the state and they will take smart people with them.

Second, the secondary benefactors of a vibrant tech industry, such as restaurants, stores and recreational facilities, will go out of business or severely reduce staff.

Third, the tech industry will be leery of ever returning to Pennsylvania. In fact, the computer and cell phone tax will scare away all prospects at a time when the state spends millions trying to get tech companies to relocate to here.

Dumb and dumber!

Fourth, with few or no high-tech jobs, Pennsylvania will export more and more of its best and brightest students.

Taxing our prosperity is the wrong move at the wrong time for the wrong reasons.Don't tax prosperity!

Don't kill the golden goose.

•Kelly Lewis, is President & CEO of TechQuest Pennsylvania, operated by the Technology Council of Central Pennsylvana Inc.

The Gadget Cube via the Central Penn Business Journal.