OPINION
DIMOND, Senior Justice.
During its 1980 session the Alaska legislature enacted two statutes, one pertaining to tax relief, and the other, to distribution of the state’s oil wealth. The first enactment, AS 43.20.010-.100 (Ch. 21, SLA 1980), referred to as the Permanent Fund Statute, provides for a cash distribution of the income derived from the Alaska Permanent Fund1 based upon the number of years an individual has been a resident of the state since 1959, the year that Alaska became a state.
The other statute, relating to the state income tax, completely exempts from taxation the income of those individuals who have filed an Alaska income tax return and [424]*424reported gross income from sources within Alaska for three or more years. AS 43.20.-017 (Ch. 22, SLA 1980).
The Zobels, both residents of the state since 1978, filed suit against the state in superior court on April 28, 1980, seeking a declaration that both statutes were unconstitutional and an injunction prohibiting their enforcement. After extensive briefing on both sides, the superior court held a hearing on a motion for summary judgment on June 12,1980, and issued a memorandum decision on June 27, 1980. The judge concluded that both statutes were unconstitutional because they denied the Zobels their right to equal treatment under the Alaska Constitution.2 Both sides appealed.
On September 4, 1980, we issued an order affirming that portion of the superior court’s decision which invalidated the income tax statute and indicated that an opinion would follow. In the order we reserved consideration of that portion of the superior court’s judgment which pertained to the permanent fund distribution system. This opinion accordingly addresses only the tax statute.
I. The Income Tax Exemption Statute.
The principal subsections of the tax exemption statute that are in dispute are AS 43.20.017(a) through (c), which are set forth in the margin.3 Those individuals who have filed income tax returns reporting income from Alaska sources for the past three years are immediately exempt from paying any further state personal income taxes. Those who have filed tax returns in two previous years are exempt from two-thirds of the tax that would ordinarily be levied under the existing tax structure, and those that have filed in one previous year are exempt from one-third of their tax.
The state argues that the system of exemptions falls equally on residents, nonresidents, shorter term Alaskan residents and longer term residents. At oral argument, and in its brief, the state argued at length that there is no evidence of purposeful discrimination against new residents created by the system of exemptions, and that any disproportionate impact the statute may have is incidental to the legislation’s main objectives.
We think the state’s argument is merit-less. Regardless of the lack of evidence of purposeful discrimination, the effect of the statute will be that few long-term residents of Alaska will ever have to pay income taxes,4 while anyone moving to Alaska will have to pay taxes for three years.
All Alaskans who have lived here and filed tax returns for more than three years will be exempt from the income tax. Younger long-term residents who file state income tax returns for earnings from summer and part-time jobs can satisfy the three-year exemption requirement by the time they enter the labor force as full-time employees.
[425]*425It is true that some nonresidents, such as fishermen who come to the state each year, will also be exempt under this statute. But we believe the pattern of the impact of the statutory scheme is so striking that it would be naive to assume that the statute does not place the principal burden of taxation on new residents. Contrary to what the state and the dissenters argue, discrimination against new residents created by the series of exemptions is apparent from the statute. Therefore, the legal question presented is whether Alaska may selectively impose an income tax on new residents.
The tax statute in effect imposes a dura-tional period of residency before new residents are accorded tax-free status. In analyzing the Zobels’ equal protection challenge, we must review those lines of cases which have considered durational residency requirements.
II. Durational Residency Requirements under the United States and Alaska Constitutions.
Case law from the United States Supreme Court interpreting the United States Constitution in this area begins with Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U.S. 618, 89 S.Ct. 1322, 22 L.Ed.2d 600 (1969), which struck down a one-year durational residency requirement as a condition for receiving welfare benefits. Since then, there have been a series of cases considering the validity of such requirements. Typically the analysis has focused on the equal protection clause of the fourteenth amendment of the United States Constitution and the constitutional right to travel.5 The relationship between these two constitutional protections, which may not be immediately clear, is that a durational residency requirement does not treat equally those individuals who have recently exercised their constitutional right to travel and those who have not. Individuals who belong to that class of people who have recently migrated to a state are denied certain rights and benefits granted to other residents. In effect, the argument is that a durational residency requirement impermis-sibly penalizes those who have exercised a constitutional right.
In Dunn v. Blumstein, 405 U.S. 330, 92 S.Ct. 995, 31 L.Ed.2d 274 (1972), Justice Marshall, who wrote the majority decision, suggested that any penalty on a group of people who have recently exercised the constitutional right to travel is impermissible. In response to the argument that some evidence of actual deterrence to travel need be shown, the opinion notes:
This view represents a fundamental misunderstanding of the law. It is irrelevant whether disenfranchisement or denial of welfare is the more potent deterrent to travel. Shapiro did not rest upon a finding that denial of welfare actually deterred travel. Nor have other “right to travel” cases in this Court always relied on the presence of actual deterrence.
405 U.S. at 339-40, 92 S.Ct. at 1001, 31 L.Ed.2d at 283 (footnotes omitted). Furthermore, the opinion concludes that because “[djurational residence laws imper-missibly condition and penalize the right to travel by imposing their prohibitions on only those persons who have recently exercised that right”, such laws “must be measured by a strict equal protection test: they are unconstitutional unless the State can demonstrate that such laws are ‘necessary to promote a compelling governmental interest.’ ” 405 U.S. at 342, 92 S.Ct. at 1003, 31 L.Ed.2d at 284 (emphasis in original) (citations omitted).
The majority of the Supreme Court agreed in Dunn that the denial of the right to vote for one year was a significant enough penalty that the state would have to justify such a law by showing a counterbalancing compelling state interest. However, the view that this strict test must be used in evaluating all durational residency requirements has never commanded a majority of the Court. A year after Dunn, in Vlandis v. Kline, 412 U.S. 441, 93 S.Ct. 2230, 37 L.Ed.2d 63 (1973), the Court noted in [426]*426dictum that eligibility, for reduced tuition at a state university could be premised on a durational residency requirement. In support of this conclusion, the Supreme Court cited in a footnote (id. at 452 n. 9, 93 S.Ct. at 2236 n. 9, 37 L.Ed.2d at 72 n. 9) its affirmance of Starns v. Malkerson, 326 F.Supp. 234 (D.C.Minn.1970), aff’d, 401 U.S. 985, 91 S.Ct. 1231, 28 L.Ed.2d 527 (1971). In Starns, a three-judge district court had concluded that the University of Minnesota could condition payment of instate tuition on a one-year durational requirement, and specifically rejected the use of the “strict scrutiny” equal protection analysis. 326 F.Supp. at 238.
The following year the Court considered the question of whether free medical care for indigents could be conditioned on a one-year residency requirement. Memorial Hospital v. Maricopa County, 415 U.S. 250, 94 S.Ct. 1076, 39 L.Ed.2d 306 (1974). The majority opinion, again authored by Justice Marshall, seems to retreat from the Court's earlier unequivocal position in Dunn that any durational residency requirement must be justified by a compelling state interest. The opinion suggests that durational residency requirements only impinge on the right to travel when such a requirement is used by a state to condition the right to receive “basic necessities of life” or a “fundamental political right.” 415 U.S. at 259, 94 S.Ct. at 1082, 39 L.Ed.2d at 315. Only because the majority found that medical care was a basic necessity of life did it conclude that a compelling state interest had to be shown to justify the requirement.
Finally, in 1975, the Court sustained an Iowa statute that conditioned divorce on one year of residency in the state. Sosna v. Iowa, 419 U.S. 393, 95 S.Ct. 553, 42 L.Ed.2d 532 (1975). Justices Marshall and Brennan noted in a dissenting opinion:
[t]he Court . . . has not only declined to apply the “compelling interest” test to this case, it has conjured up possible justifications for the State’s restriction in a manner much more akin to the lenient standard we have in the past applied in analyzing equal protection challenges to business regulations.
419 U.S. at 420, 95 S.Ct. at 568, 42 L.Ed.2d at 553 (citations omitted).
To summarize, in the federal courts it now appears that laws which deny or restrict certain benefits to new residents will only be subjected to strict scrutiny when they deny “basic necessities of life” or some “fundamental political right.” In retrospect, one may question whether Shapiro and its progeny are “right to travel” cases at all, because denial of welfare benefits or political rights to any class of people, whether newly arrived migrants or some other class, would always seem to justify strict scrutiny.
A review of our durational residency cases can be easily summarized. We have never used anything but “strict scrutiny” equal protection analysis.6 In Hicklin v. Orbeck, 565 P.2d 159 (Alaska 1977), rev’d on other grounds, 437 U.S. 518, 98 S.Ct. 2482, 57 L.Ed.2d 397 (1978), which was decided some two years after Sosna v. Iowa, 419 U.S. 393, 95 S.Ct. 553, 42 L.Ed.2d 532 (1975), we noted that “[w]e have never used this ‘basic necessities’ reasoning.” 565 P.2d at 163. As recently as Castner v. Homer, 598 P.2d 953 (Alaska 1979), we used strict scrutiny to analyze a city ordinance imposing a one-year durational residency requirement on the right to run for an elective city office.
Although we found a compelling state interest, and sustained the ordinance in [427]*427Gastner (598 P.2d at 957), it is obvious that few durational residency requirements could withstand such an analysis. In light of our holding in State v. Erickson, 574 P.2d 1 (Alaska 1978), we believe that it is now appropriate to reexamine our conclusion, as expressed in our prior decisions, that all durational residency requirements must necessarily trigger the highest level of equal protection scrutiny.
In Erickson, we noted our prior dissatisfaction with the two-tiered model of equal protection used in federal constitutional analysis. We concluded that a single test would be more appropriate, and described the functioning of that test in the following terms:
Initially, we must look to the purpose of the statute, viewing the legislation as a whole, and the circumstances surrounding it. It must be determined that this purpose is legitimate, that it falls within the police power of the state. Examining the means used to accomplish the legislative objectives and the reasons advanced therefore, the court must then determine whether the means chosen substantially further the goals of the enactment. Finally, the state interest in the chosen means must be balanced against the nature of the constitutional right involved.
574 P.2d at 12 (footnotes omitted).
We noted that where federal constitutional questions were present which involved a suspect class or fundamental right, we would still be bound to use a test at least the equivalent in severity as the compelling governmental interest or strict scrutiny test used by the United States Supreme Court. When federal strict scrutiny was not required, however, we would be free to adopt our own test in gauging the importance of the right to equal treatment under the Alaska constitution. Id. at 11-12.
We conclude now that durational residency requirements should be measured against the test discussed in Erickson. When a law conditions the receipt of some right or benefit upon a period of residency, we will balance the importance of the denial of the right or benefit against those legitimate government objectives which make it justifiable to classify people on the basis of their length of residency. As we stated in Erickson, a burden will be placed on the state to show that a classification “has a fair and substantial relation to a legitimate governmental objective,” and that a greater or lesser burden to make such a showing will be based on the nature of the right or benefit involved. State v. Erickson, 574 P.2d 1, 11-12 (Alaska 1978).
Freedom from disparate taxation is not a federally protected fundamental right for the purpose of equal protection analysis under the fourteenth amendment.7 Therefore, we shall analyze the tax law under our general standard of equal protection discussed above.
III. The Tax Exemption System under the Alaska Equal Protection Clause.
Under Erickson, the beginning of our analysis is an examination of the legitimacy of the purposes of the enactment. The statute does not contain a statement of purposes, but in its brief the state has summarized what it believes to be the purpose of a selective, rather than a total, repeal of the income tax law. We have rearranged and reworded the statement of purposes slightly from the text of the state’s brief:
(1) the plan should keep the state’s income tax audit and collection staff intact;
(2) the plan should not saddle individuals with an empty and burdensome annual filing requirement;
(3) the revenue collection bureaucracy should be in proportion in size and cost to the amount of revenue collected;
(4) the plan should not redistribute the income tax burden so that it falls only on the very highest income earners, but it [428]*428should retain the existing progressive structure;
(5) the plan should not result in a “windfall” to persons who receive the protections, services and benefits provided by the state that are closely related to the earning of income, but who have never before contributed to the costs of providing those programs;
(6) the plan should not entirely relieve individuals of their obligation to help defray the costs of government.
The first three purposes relate to the administrative convenience of the Department of Revenue. The essence of the state’s position seems to be that, by requiring only one particular class of people in the state to pay income taxes, it is possible to reduce the workload and size of the bureaucracy needed to process tax returns. We have recognized the validity of administrative convenience as a legislative purpose, Commercial Fisheries Entry Commission v. Apokedak, 606 P.2d 1255, 1265-66 (Alaska 1980), but have given it little weight. Restricting the income tax to any narrow class of people, however arbitrarily it might be drawn, would achieve the same result of reducing the number of tax returns filed each year. For example, the income tax could be selectively imposed on those with social security numbers ending with an odd number. In a close case, administrative convenience might tip the balance in favor of the government, but standing alone this reason cannot justify selectively imposing a tax on new arrivals to the state.
The fourth reason advanced by the state is that the present statute furthers the purpose of maintaining a progressive tax structure. What the state means by this is the familiar concept that those earning larger incomes will be in higher tax brackets and will pay a greater proportion of their income in taxes than those earning less income. The new tax law does not achieve this objective. At best it will produce a totally random tax rate, and at worst it will actually be regressive-forcing those with lower incomes to pay higher taxes.
Under the new tax system, the tax will only be progressive within a given exemption year class. For example, if one compares two new one-year residents, one who earns $10,000 in a tax year and the other who earns $50,000, it is obvious that the taxpayer earning $50,000 will pay more income tax, both in absolute terms, and as a proportion of income, than the person who earns $10,000. But if one looks at the income earning population at large in the state, this result will not follow. A three-year resident of the state who earns $50,000 will, because of the exemption scheme, pay no state income tax, while the person who has recently migrated and earns $10,000 will pay a full share. Thus the exact opposite of a progressive tax structure has been achieved by the present legislation.8 We cannot accept this rationale for taxing new residents.
The essence of the state’s fifth statement of purpose, as we understand it, is that, because former residents have had to pay income taxes for many years in the past, it would somehow not be “fair” to allow newcomers to escape this burden, even though the tax revenue itself may not be needed. If one were to accept the state’s logic, it would lead to the absurd result that no tax could ever be completely repealed. The tax supposedly is needed today so that today’s new residents can achieve parity with longer term residents. When today’s new residents have achieved parity, future residents will be obliged to achieve parity with today’s residents, ad infinitum, so that total repeal would always be “unfair” to the last preceding group that had achieved parity.
A far more serious criticism of this rationale for a tax is that discussed in Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U.S. 618, 632-33, 89 S.Ct. 1322, 1330, 22 L.Ed.2d 600, 614 (1969). The Supreme Court noted that awarding bene[429]*429fits to new residents based upon their past tax contributions
would logically permit the State to bar new residents from schools, parks, and libraries or deprive them of police and fire protection. Indeed it would permit the State to apportion all benefits and services according to the past tax contributions of its citizens. The Equal Protection Clause prohibits such an apportionment of state services. [Footnote omitted.]
While the Court in Shapiro was discussing the denial of welfare benefits, we think the same principle is applicable when forcing a state’s new residents to bear a disproportionate tax burden. We believe that the reason the Supreme Court of the United States has indicated that it is not a “constitutionally permissible state objective,” Shapiro, 394 U.S. at 633, 89 S.Ct. at 1330, 22 L.Ed.2d at 614, to apportion state benefits and services according to the past contributions of its citizenry, is that such a rationale logically could lead to pervasive and profound inequality in nearly all phases of a state’s relationship with its citizens. That, in any event, is our view of the implications of the argument.
If we were to accept the state’s argument, boroughs and cities in Alaska could begin granting tax exemptions in such a way that only newcomers would pay the costs of local government. Other states might decide to impose income tax surcharges on their new residents. Such a system would create a patchwork of tax havens for long term residents. Each time someone moved, he or she would face the prospect of “buying in” to a new community. Such a concept is more than an imaginary threat to the right to travel, and we conclude that it also violates our own constitutional right to equal treatment. We cannot accept the state’s fifth statement of purpose as a legitimate goal of a state tax.
Finally, while we can accept the state’s sixth reason for maintaining an income tax-that individuals should not be totally exempt from an obligation to help defray the costs of government-we conclude that this purpose can be achieved by means which do not discriminate against new residents. We therefore conclude that AS 43.-20.017(a)--(c) is unconstitutional.
The dissenting opinion argues at some length, with frequent citation to federal authority, that the statute is constitutionally acceptable. Because the tax statute is violative of the Alaska Constitution, we do not reach the question of whether it violates the federal constitution. We do note, though, that the privileges and immunities clause of article IV, section 2 of the United States Constitution is generally regarded as prohibiting discrimination against nonresidents on “fundamental” matters such as, under the classic formulation of the doctrine by Mr. Justice Washington, “taxes or impositions”.9 Under the privileges and immunities clause the United States Supreme Court has struck down two state tax schemes which are quite similar to Alaska’s new statute. See Austin v. New Hampshire, 420 U.S. 656, 95 S.Ct. 1191, 43 L.Ed.2d 530 (1975), and Travis v. Yale & Towne Manufacturing Co., 252 U.S. 60, 40 S.Ct. 228, 64 L.Ed. 460 (1920). Both cases involved tax systems which had the effect of taxing nonresident commuters at higher rates than residents. In New Hampshire, which does not have a state income tax, the effect of the law was to force commuters from the bordering states of Maine and Massachusetts to pay income taxes to New Hampshire, while New Hampshire residents paid nothing. Although Alaska does not have nonresident commuters, the state does have something close to it in the highly transient workforce that is associated with the military and large construction projects. These Supreme Court decisions cast serious doubt on the validity of the Alaska tax law on federal constitutional grounds as well.10
[430]*430We also notice in the Travis and Austin decisions the wariness the Supreme Court has shown for tax schemes that impose disproportionate burdens on those persons who cannot adequately represent themselves in the legislatures of the states. This is a problem that occurs not only when states tax nonresidents, but also when states attempt to levy taxes on entities of the federal government, whose interests are similarly unrepresented in state legislatures. In M’Culloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. 316, 17 U.S. 316, 428, 4 L.Ed. 579, 607 (1819), which considered the validity of a state tax oh a federal bank, Chief Justice Marshall wrote:
In imposing a tax the legislature acts upon its constituents. This is in general a sufficient security against erroneous and oppressive taxation. . . . But the means employed by the government of the Union have no such security ....
The logic of M’Culloch is applicable here. Although it is true that new residents are technically represented in the legislature, as a practical matter their interests may not be adequately protected. It takes time to participate meaningfully in the political mainstream of a community. New residents are likely to be poorly organized and fragmented, which makes it too easy to impose on them “erroneous and oppressive taxation.” Id. Furthermore, under article II, section 2, of the Alaska Constitution new residents must wait three years before they are eligible to run for election to the legislature-precisely the same period during which they must pay income taxes. For these reasons, we are not persuaded by the views expressed in the dissent.
The Zobels have cross-appealed, contending that declaring these sections of the income tax law invalid should result in the repeal of the personal income tax. They frame the issue correctly as, “Had the legislature known that this classification was impermissible, would it have repealed the tax for everyone, or would it have chosen to apply the tax across the board?” However, we disagree with their conclusion.
Here there are really two questions of severability: first, whether the prior filing requirement is severable from the tax exemption statute. If so, then the exemption would be effective without regard to the prior filing requirement-in effect, the exemption would swallow up the tax.
The second issue is whether the tax exemption statute, as a whole, is severable from the remainder of the state income tax code. If not, then the entire state income tax would fall.
The test to be applied is stated in Lynden Transport, Inc. v. State, 532 P.2d 700, 713 (Alaska 1975) (footnote omitted):
The test for determining the severability of a statute is twofold. A provision will not be deemed severable “unless it appears both that, standing alone, legal effect can be given to it and that the legislature intended the provision to stand, in case others included in the act and held bad should fall.”
We cannot sever the prior filing requirement from the tax exemption provision without substantially redrafting the statute. Without the phrases dealing with the prior filing requirement, the statute is meaningless. As such, we find that legal effect cannot be given to the tax exemption statute without the prior filing requirement, and thus the entire exemption provision must fall.
Nor do we agree that the invalidity of the exemption statute must invalidate the entire state income tax code. Eliminating all the language of the 1980 amendment leaves the tax code intelligible, and thus legal effect can be given to it without the invalid exemption provision. The question then turns to legislative intent.
The Zobels contend that, as the legislature has eliminated the income tax for the majority of Alaskans, total elimination conforms more closely to the legislative intent than total reinstatement and imposition of [431]*431the income tax. For several reasons, we disagree. First, the entire code is preceded by a general severability clause, which expresses a general legislative intent in favor of severability, albeit a weak one: See Lynden Transport, Inc. v. State, 532 P.2d 700, 712-13 (Alaska 1975). Second, the permanent fund statute contains an explicit non-severability clause, and the absence of such a clause in the tax exemption statute, enacted simultaneously, may indicate a legislative intent that the latter be severable. Last, the purposes put forward by the state indicate that the legislature may not have favored complete elimination of the income tax.
Because we hold the tax exemption statute severable from the entire state income tax code, sections 2, 3,10, and 11 of chapter 22, SLA 1980, are not affected by this decision.
The judgment of the superior court insofar as it concerns the tax exemption statute, AS 43.20.017 (chapter 22, SLA 1980), is AFFIRMED.
BOOCHEVER, J., not participating.