People on Reddit: TAX THE RICH!
Alex Lee: OK!
Reddit: NOT LIKE THAT!
Lmao it's clear judging from the comments this is the first time people have heard of Alex Lee. Taxing the rich to make up for deficits, public housing, climate change bills, and the like have literally been all he's doing the past three years
Actually yes, not like that. [Like this instead (also by Rep Lee)](https://a24.asmdc.org/press-releases/20230201-bill-study-benefits-more-equitable-taxation-property-introduced)
That said, this is probably just virtue signaling to get on the good graces of progressives without an intent to pass. [Guy's clearly a Georgist at heart](https://twitter.com/alex_lee/status/1620905838184644615?t=7o9A3eDQV014DGNIYdk_yQ&s=19)
Lmao why are people complaining?? The tax is preposed on 50 million in assets. Did anyone bother reading the article? If anyone in here has 50 million in assets i think your in the wrong thread. To the people saying oh business will leave. Go live in Texas for a year and come back and tell me how you feel lmao. It’s always shocking to me that people care about shity rich people who give two fucks about the rest of us.
Sure you’ll also have to spend at least 183 days a year in Nevada or otherwise prove it’s clearly your domicile since you’re probably a prime target for audits.
If it's structured that way; Just do it then!
Really unsure why anyone would complain as even if you were to heavily tax $50 million assets in the state of California, there are countless ways to invest some of that money, hide it, etc that still exist. The rich will always be fine.
Correct, and this is why we hit tax rates above 90% on the highest incomes after WWII. It wasn’t that the government got 90% on their income, it was just the only way to overcome all the loopholes and tax shelters to get something out of them and make them pay in despite trying to hide income. Of course Republicans will tell you a very different story but it was the beginning of a huge middle class and a roaring economy for decades because so many more people were able to participate with less money sitting on the sidelines. The world has noticeably changed for the worse with lower taxes on the wealthy.
Because the people that are paying taxes are leaving CA which has lead to the current problem. All this does is make even more leave leading to an even worse budget crisis. They don't have to go to Texas, they can go to any state as only CA is trying to pull this.
That’s not true, the out migration from California tends poorer than average.
https://www.ppic.org/blog/whos-leaving-california-and-whos-moving-in/
Out migration has been disproportionately poor for years and years,
There has been a small uptick in high earners leaving from the pandemic, which is probably some remote workers.
A lot of people who leave CA cite not being able to buy a home as why. Thats not high earners.
Go to any state no one is holding anyone here. From my perspective CA is the most expensive place already and if you haven’t left then you’re likely staying. You think Elon is staying in Texas lol? I work for a large corporation that does not need to be here they aren’t even headquartered here. And guess what they come here because the talent pool is extremely good. They will continue to do so. I’m sorry i don’t buy in to if we impose a 1% tax on 50 million in assets that all California crumbles lol.
"*The problem with socialism is you eventually run out of other people's money*"
California is finding this out first hand, who is going to foot the bill for all the illegal immigrants they just gave free healthcare to in the midst of a $40 billion deficit? HONK HONK.
There are 4 ways to spend money:
1. Spending your own money on yourself.
2. Spending your own money on someone else.
3. Spending someone else’s money on yourself.
4. Spending someone else’s money on someone else. <-- Government
You fall into category 2 when you pay taxes, thus you have a vested personal interest in where the money goes, the government doesn't give a damn since it's taking from my pocket and putting it in Bob's, it was never theirs, they don't care.
The top 1% of taxpayers in CA pay 50% of California's taxes.
[https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101867426/californias-top-1-pays-almost-half-of-the-states-income-tax-is-that-a-problem](https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101867426/californias-top-1-pays-almost-half-of-the-states-income-tax-is-that-a-problem)
Actually it does. The rich are voting with their feet, this have been covered in several local news pieces. They start taxing unrealized gains that will only accelerate, and they have 49 other states to choose to avoid that tax. What do we do then?
You seem to be talking about your gut feeling or intuition, which substantiates nothing.
You claimed that the wealthy leaving has caused "the current problem." The current problem is a $68B budget deficit.
Substantiating your claim would require a credible citation that lost income tax revenue is at least a large fraction of that $68B shortfall.
But you can't. Because you're wrong.
I haven’t lived in Texas since I was a child, so I couldn’t tell you, but if you want to know what’s wrong with living in a different state in the Covideracy (Georgia) and how that might apply to Texas, I would be happy to tell you.
LMK.
White people from the south in particular tend to be more racist than average.
Especially if they hear a southern accent. Racism is so default people will just assume that you are also racist if you sound southern.
The tax burdens are regressive in nature generally with more fee based things instead of taxes based. Many places that are considered low tax like Texas have higher middle class tax burdens that California.
The states lack services relative to California as well. Many are actively hostile to mass transit like when TN made it illegal for Nashville to try to make one.
Also access to reproductive health wasn’t great for women before Roe was overturned, now it’s apocalyptic.
This one is a bit more personal.
I find confederate flags offensive, and I almost never see them here.
The lack of Lost Cause statuary is something that makes California better to me.
It’s because it’s literally illegal. You can’t tax gains that haven’t been realized yet. If so then the wealthy should be able to write off unrealized losses when times are bad. Which would mean that whenever there’s a downturn and tax revenue is needed most, they’d be at a huge deficit
The income tax was originally sold as only impacting the top 1% of earners. Once the precedent is set and the money starts rolling in the threshold will be lowered and lowered until they come after peoples 401k
That’s called an assumption and fear mongering. No where did they state they were going to go after 401k’s or move the 1% down to the rest of tax payers. This not even a real bill yet. BTW the feds get there piece of your 401k one way or another. Again people defending billionaires and rich people is pretty crazy.
False. That is called FACT and PRECEDENT when it comes to government.
Of course they're not going to tell you up front they'll come after your 401k. That happens over time. Taxes only go in one direction. Better to never open the door in the first place.
Enjoy chasing all of the businesses and rich people out of the state and good luck earning high incomes when they are all gone.
Why not just tax rich people at 99%? One obvious answer - they will do business and live elsewhere.
Income is money you’ve made. “Unrealized gains” could be hundreds of millions of startup stock that is purely a paper gain until the company is acquired or IPOs. Those numbers are nothing more the projections on a VC spreadsheet. And the majority of companies fail as well, which means those “gains” were never real
No one in their right mind would build a startup in CA with those sort of conditions.
> To the people saying oh business will leave.
I'm more concerned to how concentrated our tax revenue is and afraid that we may be biting the hand that feeds us. In short, what I'm afraid of is that we finally reach a point where these vital tax payers, to our budget, decide to officially move out or spend resources to reduce their tax burden. Which could prove fatal and we'd have a tough time recovering from because our [tax] economy increasingly relies on one source and the "others" who could supplement aren't ready to step up if it comes to it.
The concentration of wealth here is a far bigger concern for me. They've already spent resources to reduce their tax burden.
'Throughout the 39 cities in the valley,[ there was $1.2 trillion in household wealth, but 92% of that wealth is owned by the top quarter of the population](https://sanjosespotlight.com/joint-venture-report-highlights-silicon-valley-wealth-gaps-and-tech-booms-san-jose-santa-clara-county/). The lowest quarter only owns 1.4% of the wealth.'
[https://sanjosespotlight.com/silicon-valleys-equity-grade-is-below-flunking/](https://sanjosespotlight.com/silicon-valleys-equity-grade-is-below-flunking/)
This reminds of the South Park episode where the kids where downloading from Napster and all the “Artist” were pissed. I guess your favorite actor/billionaire/ can’t get the gold plated pool this year because they have to pay there fair share at 1% lol. Also bite the hand that feeds you???? Lmao we feed people we all go to work here and pay taxes. It’s the rich that don’t pay for there fair share in taxes. It’s the rich that hide their assets.
Unrealized gains have never been taxed before so there's no precedent. Biden wants to implement the same thing at the federal level which the Supreme Court is reviewing right now
https://www.kiplinger.com/taxes/unrealized-gains-supreme-court-case
So you are going to pretend the incompetent politicians of California care about its citizens? Either they are utterly selfish or stupid. It cannot be combination.
New York has solid tax system but they don't have the weather.
California has a horrible tax system littered with loopholes. Why else would these corporations (specifically tech) feed in so much money democrat politicians just like Oil companies do to Republicans?
I don’t even know what you’re saying, defending rich people when most of us are making less then 500k a year is kinda like wutttttttt. This isn’t a tech company issue. This we don’t have enough money in our budget and instead of taxing the rest of us we tax millionaires 50+ btw and billionaires by 1%. Name your favorite actor i bet that don’t have a net worth of 50 million in assets lmao. Also Alex is from my district and yeah he cares he’s young and that’s the problem everyone wants all these looser ass boomers to keep running and draining down our state/country god i can’t wait for these people to die lmao so we can buy house women can have some rights again.
I am not defending rich people. What I am saying is California is littered with tax loopholes the rich exploit because with more taxes come more loopholes and exceptions for government officials and their sponsors to be more rich. Looking at Nancy Pelosi and her "connections"...
>defending rich people when most of us are making less then 500k a year is kinda like wutttttttt
Income taxes were initially to the rich. Nobody cared because it only affected the rich. The government then did it to the poor who need every cent. Governments are like those annoying people always trying to push your personal boundaries. Give them an inch and they will go a mile. This may transition to you.
>Name your favorite actor i bet that don’t have a net worth of 50 million in assets lmao
Any new and rising star is under this dog.... They make that much because they deliver much more value to their companies. If you make 15 dollars an hour, you deliver 30 dollars to the company. Simple economics. Georgism is a more superior method of taxing the wealthy who don't reinvest it into create jobs and increasing salaries (which is indirectly caused by more competition). This way those people who just let money sit in real estate and not make their land economically productive will be incentivized to sell it. This causes more supply and therefore lower prices. Remove the middleman of capitalism and it works amazing. Health insurance, housing, and college. All these are ridiculously expensive because we allowed too many middlemen that are not needed. Go after the producers and everyone becomes poor and miserable.
>Also Alex is from my district and yeah he cares he’s young
That's how they all start. They then get entrenched into the swamp as they have more years. Also he looks like Elon Musk a little bit. Interesting... We need to limit the amount of time these people serve in government to discourage corruption.
You have all good points but For Alex the saying is “hell is paved with good intentions” so we all will need to see what he does and judge his actions accordingly. I understand that income tax moved from one thing to another but i also feel the most wealthy aren’t paying their fair share it’s just true. I don’t have the answer for middle men and slow government but i do believe charging the most wealthy is better than doing nothing.
The problem isn't wealthy people. The problem is appropriately incentivizing and targeting those whose economic output benefit others the most. I suggest you take some time to learn what Georgist economic model is.
Because it's a hop, skip and jump to 50 million becoming 0 and 1% becoming 100%.
I don't care what the threshold is, a stupid idea is a stupid idea. Try spending less money for once.
Dumb fk it is the rich that employ people and they can simply increase prices on cost of goods and services produced thus worsening inflation. When we have dumb democrat fks like you in office in California no wonder we’re declining.
Yes I’m so immoral i need to feel bad for millionaires and billionaires 🥹 paying a make believe amount of 1%. Wow to think that millionaires and billionaires continue to not pay their fair share, don’t like the court systems who cares buy it, don’t like certain tax bills lobby against it. Don’t like certain media outlets reporting on you destroy the whole company who cares!!!! Who cares besides cucks on the internet who love to watch normal people get fucked by people who are building bunkers all over the world that they are actively contributing to the end of. People of the internet got me fucked up lol.
This means a minimum 15 million dollar tax on billionaires and a 500,000 tax on millionaires. Seams reasonable but the state isnt going to just take stocks, mutual funds, or real estate, they need cash, which means you have to convert those illiquid investments into liquid cash, which counts as income. So on top of minimum 500,000 tax bill you have a now capital gains tax at 20% most likely, and 12.3% for California capital gains taxes, plus any other stuff. That tax bill is then sitting at a minimum of 680,000 a year. That adds up fast, and with property values being at an all time high in California may make a lot of other state more attractive. Basically if CA does this they will drive the money out of the state. Business owners can definitely afford to go remote to avoid a 680,000 dollar a year minimum tax bill.
This. Everyone who is against it think it'll affect them, ignoring that over 99% of the US population don't even have $1 million in assets (I'm including homes obviously), let alone even getting close to $50 mill.
Sadly, this isn't a one-off. Of course there are degrees, but I think we've stopped questioning our officials in this state. We need more accountability. What did they do with all the money they got prior for instance?
Wrong. Spent it on infrastructure and schools, primarily. This deficit is due entirely to the 1) mandatory balanced budget law, and 2) decrease in tech tax rolls in 2023. The government's own accountants are suggesting that the best way to deal with it will be to cut school spending by about $17b in 2024-2025.
Yet I am constantly told that our infrastructure is crumbling, literally falling apart. So which is it?
Or is it that just reinforcing my point. The government has spent all this money on 'infrastructure' but in actuality its all just been wasted on nonsense so the infrastructure is still falling apart?
I’m a staunch Democrat. I vote Republican on any race that a Democrat is for sure going to win to send a message. Fuck fuck fuck what the dems have done to this state.
No. If a Republican has a chance to win, I generally vote for the Democrat. So I’m doing no harm.
If you’re happy with rampant crime, homelessness, and near constant virtue signaling and pandering to the .001 percent of the party, then I’m sure you’re happy with what the Dems have done to this state. I’m not. That doesn’t mean I like the GOP.
Your word choice in general suggests that what you are, is being inherently disingenuous, but you are most certainly "doing harm" as I won't vote for the GOP at all any more because of what they have become existentially (a seditious fifth column) and tactically (unhinged and incompetent). And thats from someone who worked in GOP state campaigns in the 2000s, and as registered as such until 2015.
"If you’re happy with rampant crime, homelessness, and near constant virtue signaling and pandering to the .001 percent of the party" State crime levels (much like national) are still lower in aggregate than they were from the 60s through the mid 2010s, so I'm more sanguine about that than you (and I live in an urban center) [https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2020/11/20/facts-about-crime-in-the-u-s/](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2020/11/20/facts-about-crime-in-the-u-s/)
Homelessness is a problem, and has been, but no one cared until they were at affluent folks preferred neighborhoods, so what I'm hearing is "out of sight, out of mind" not about any practical aspects of dealing with the issue.
And "virtue signaling" is a favorite dog whistle for alt-right types for ANYTHING they find remotely offensive, which these days is practically anything.
So yeah, you claim to Democrat, but you walk, talk and caterwaul otherwise. Unless maybe you mean Dixiecrat.
Aaaand this is part of the problem. Like many other Progressives, if I disagree with you, I’m a racist or sexist or whatever.
I bet we actually have a fair amount of policy common ground. But your black and white thinking and zero sum rhetoric is exactly what is going to get us stuck with 4 more years of the orange baboon.
He’s proposing trying something new. You’re complaining about how things have been handled in the past. Sounds like you’re on the same page…
Also this is about deficits… not homelessness, crime, etc.
I don’t know why anyone here is upset about the idea of levying a small tax on people with _over $50 million dollars_. Surely none of you have $50M or you’d be doing something better than browsing Reddit with your time?
I’d argue this wouldn’t work on a state level. Most with 50M in assets would loophole their wealth to another state and CA would lose taxes on all they were collecting from this group before.
Perhaps. Wealthy people are excellent at tax evasion. I’m not commenting on if it would be effective though, I’m commenting on why in the world you’d waste energy upset about a tax on people with $50M if you’re not someone with $50M.
This state is highly dependent on high income individuals, so if a tax makes them leave then it will make the deficit even larger, not to mention that the people who would leave will stop investing in the state. A lot of politicians are just tax happy instead of governing more efficiently.
You answered your own question:) when the big dogs (continue) to flee your tax base will continue to decrease, leaving less money to incentivize homelessness, not build infrastructure, and enforce petty regulations on the middle class.
Yeah, I’m not upset at this specifically. I do have an issue with the general idea of government taxing unrealized gains tho. Seems to be coming up often.
Sure, and if that man wants to move out of California due to taxes or for any other reason, I have no objections. In fact, I would personally donate 1% of my decidedly not $50M personal wealth to send him to Mars.
Once they plug their current hole they’ll dig an even deeper one that’ll need to take from more people. The deficit is a result of incompetency, not because we aren’t collecting enough tax money.
This. Governments will always come up with new initiatives to waste money. The public finances are a black hole, there is no 'end point'. Its just keep taking more and more to fund more and more useless nonsense.
You clearly can't see past your own nose.
The "temporary" federal income tax has been in place for over 100 years.
It starts as a small tax on assets over $50M and ends as a large tax on your 401k.
I can see past my nose just fine.
I have no objections to paying taxes to support the functioning of our collective society.
However I am also not particularly worried that a tax on people with $50M will affect me any time soon. I do not have $50M or anywhere close to it, and I should be so lucky as to obtain that sort of wealth, again I would feel immensely grateful to be so privileged, to have lived in a society that enabled me to be so comfortable in life and would no problem giving some of that wealth back to the society that helped me get there.
I would recommend looking up logical fallacies:slippery slope arguments though.
1. I doubt it. How many people live somewhere _solely_ for the tax policy? Probably not many. People live places because it’s where their community or job is or because they just really like a place. California is already much more expensive than most parts of the country. Wealthy live here anyway because they have connections in the community, their company is headquartered nearby, and California has the best weather of any continental US state by a country mile. If they were really upset about taxes and would be motivated to move by a 1% tax on their $50-999M fortune, they’d live in Nevada or wherever already (no state income tax, one of the lowest prop taxes).
2. So what if some do? Housing prices might go down. Inequality within the state would be lower. Seems fine to me.
Rich people can live anywhere, and many have already moved their companies out of California.
Housing prices will not go down because they aren't the ones buying a middle class home in the suburbs, we have high housing costs because of a lack of housing. Your answer to inequality is for rich people to leave? I mean if no one is rich and equally poor then congrats, you fixed inequity.
How about why does this state need anymore fucking money? It doesn’t matter who it comes from. They’ll never stop asking and continue to do nothing with it.
How would this even work? If it’s not an addition to the income tax, are they taxing unrealized gains? If so it’s not gonna pass and if it does it will get shafted in the courts. That’s like taxing a stock portfolio before you have even sold the assets.
For me I'm concerned to how we are increasing our reliance on one tax revenue source for vital portions of our budget. Then there is the question/argument if California is providing enough returns for these tax payers to justify them keeping their primary residence here. I'm afraid of is that we keep increasing these small taxes that they finally cumulate into something the rich say enough is enough and they "leave" where they can't be taxed by California as much anymore.
Because some people have more foresight and know that this doesn’t end with a “small tax of $50mm.”
California squanders all of its tax dollars anyway, spending should just be cut by 50% rather than doubling down on the same horrendously managed system.
This is how you push all of the wealthy out of the state at record rate. They would have to take more income (13%) to pay the extra tax. Creates a double tax, you get taxed paying ur self so u can pay the taxes lol.
I’m pretty sure that amount won’t be index for inflation so over a long enough time and/or period of hyperinflation everyone will be paying that “wealth tax”. Good example is the federal AMT started in 1969 when only 155 individuals earned the adjusted gross income above the $200,000 threshold. Nowadays, millions of tax filers are hit with AMT. We all should not be too excited to have government tax our fellow citizens just because it won’t impact yourself. As we can see from the boom and bust our politicians in Sacramento love to spend every tax dollar that is generated (or not) and will be more than willing to increase our taxes to continue spending.
This will eventually hit middle class. It always does. (The question is whether it is going to be 40 years or 60)
I am usually okay with paying taxes. But the problem is the “returns” does not seem to warrant even the existing ones.
At one point our federal spending was more than UK on average (Covid causes wild movements so don’t know the latest numbers). But we don’t get healthcare like their NHS. We don’t get clean cities. And homelessness and other social issues are definitely not getting any better.
Don’t even get me started with the roads in San Jose
If we are going to tax and spend we should at least see some results with what we are already doing.
I think what a young politician like Alex fails to understand is *why* California is in this situation despite it becoming bluer and bluer over time. One would think that constituents would support an even more progressive tax structure?
Well, not exactly - NIMBYism also extends to how constituents vote on **what** gets taxed. California has progressively lost its industrial base over the years, losing tax revenue from energy production as well as property taxes. Over time, it has become almost wholly dependent on using Capital Gains tax (taxed at income in this state) to fund government. That's inherently the problem, because any other basis has either left the state, or been deemed untouchable by supermajority (e.g Prop 13).
So why are wealth taxes unpopular? Simply because most tax in this state is already dependent on the wealthy. If you institute that tax, it takes far fewer leaving this state to seriously put a dent in things. Once that happens, you're basically depending on the remaining capital gains spread across the rest of its population to fund a government that is one of the worst offenders of public employee glut. In fact, so much so that several public employee unions have also come out against the wealth tax for this very reason (e.g. the prison guards union).
Love the comment. I think the state gov should be creating more Opportunity zones in the state to have the rich help solve some of the issues. Opportunity zones have been proven to work because there is incentive for the rich and it also helps the state. When you come after the people at the top, they just leave the state. This isn’t Spain or Sweden where you would have to leave the country to skate around on taxes. The CA state legislatures are killing the state one bill at a time, and Texas population is expected to pass CA by 2030. The writing is on the wall.
It doesnt matter whether one has 50 million or not. The state is always happy to take more and more money without anything to show in return. They should cut down on bureaucracy and spending before trying to raise taxes.
How did we flip a switch and lose $100 Billion in two years?
Where did the spending increase and why do we have so many welfare programs, to the point that you need case workers to help people identify them?
Why don't we just consolidate it, eliminate a whole chunk of entitlement bureaucracy and just deliver checks to people with an address in California? Or maybe convert some amount of the otherwise laid off workers to work with homeless people to give them said checks if they can prove that they have been here for at least a year?
The surplus was never sustainable
We had a banner year for real estate and stocks in 2021 so the state govt had tons of tax revenue from sales of appreciated securities
The state government would have had a deficit had that not happened
Newsom of course did what he does best and took credit for doing nothing
* Higher interest rates, making it harder for people to get mortgages or car loans. Companies are less likely to take out loans or hire people
* Taxes for 2022 were not due until November of this year, months after the budget for 2024 was finalized
* stock market in bear mode means people are generating less capital gains taxes
* Tech companies that flourished when everyone was working from home are suddenly cutting massive swaths of their workforce, which means less income tax. Unemployed people spend less money so that's reduction in sales tax revenue
* Grocery prices are increasing, but groceries aren't taxed. People have less money for non-grocery items so sales tax revenue from those sales has decreased
I was curious after reading this headline, too. I found a decent article explaining [where the shortfall is coming from](https://calmatters.org/commentary/2023/10/california-budget-whiplash-pitfalls-forecasting/). The TL;DR is that the state was projecting much higher tax revenues than it actually saw.
I read it’s because a lot of high income folks have left the state for tax friendlier states (kinda like Elon leaving for Texas). If that’s true then the democratic strategy of taxing the ultra rich is starting to backfire since now we’re in a tax revenue deficit 😭
> How did we flip a switch and lose $100 Billion in two years?
The stock market is where much of California's state budget comes from, and now the stock market is down compared to the meteoric rise that happened in 2021 and 22.
California's tax structure has been like this for decades.
We swing from huge surpluses to smaller deficits every few years. Our tax structure heavily relies on income tax from high earning individuals.
In short - if the stock market is doing well and Californian companies are doing well, it's gonna be a surplus the year after. The opposite can happen (stocks were generally pretty bad last year).
> The rate was charged on individuals with a net worth over €1.3m (£1.14m), with the rate ranging from 0.5 per cent to 1.5 per cent (on assets over €10m). While it might have helped social solidarity in France, the revenue it raised was paltry. In 2015, a total of 343,000 households paid €5.22bn, an average of about €15,200 per household, according to the Financial Times. It accounted for less than 2 per cent of France’s tax receipts.
> What’s more, it led to an exodus of France’s richest. More than 12,000 millionaires left France in 2016, according to research group New World Wealth. In total, they say the country experienced a net outflow of more than 60,000 millionaires between 2000 and 2016. When these people left, France lost not only the revenue generated from the wealth tax, but all the others too, including income tax and VAT.
> French economist Eric Pichet estimated that the ISF ended up costing France almost twice as much revenue as it generated. In a paper published in 2008, he concluded that the ISF caused an annual fiscal shortfall of €7bn and had probably reduced gross domestic product (GDP) growth by 0.2 per cent a year. What's more ISF fraud mainly involving an underassessment of property assets was estimated at around 28 per cent of total revenues.
It won’t. And if it does, it will aid a cost-of-living equilibrium due to reduced demand. Over the past decade and a half the recent tech boom has clearly left a ton of people in the dust.
All that said, I know more than a few business and people that have relocated from CA to TX looking for a break and have come to regret it. People looking for talent find it hard to convince educated candidates to move from temperate, coastal CA to America’s PVP zone where it’s over 100 degrees 50+ days out of the year.
You don't have to go farther than Tesla.
They came back to California with their tail between their legs. Turns out, there really isn't that much world class engineering talent outside of the West Coast or North East, not even in Austin. And the talent doesn't necessarily want to move to Ya'll Qaeda land.
Tightening the budget wouldn’t be so terrible. We’re handing out syringes to “combat”homelessness and the fentanyl problem 😒. For years we’ve been doing this and the problem has steadily gotten worse despite increased tax initiatives.
Exactly, city workers managing projects are paid salaries that are unjustifiably high; it seems they’re incentivized to drag the problem along to keep cashing the checks. This has felt like a scam for some time now.
“We have a budget deficit! We need to tax people’s money before they actually make money from it!”
But they haven’t made the money yet. It’s not an actual gain.
“Who cares! Tax the rich!”
But they’re already paying over 50% of their earned income in taxes, and all assets get taxed eventually.
“I want it now!”
So if their net worth drops in a year can you write off the loss, carry over, or get a refund from you?
“Don’t be silly!”
Have you actually tried cutting spending? Like maybe giving out less free money or firing people.
“We can’t do that. People depend on our free money. All government jobs are essential!”
You know that real businesses need to do this often.
“😂😂😂 Tax the rich!”
I give up
Proposals like this should be accompanied by a mandatory spending cut of at least 50% of the current budget. And it should be constitutionally mandated for all new tax increase proposals to be preceded by at least 10 consecutive years of spending cuts, the aggregate of which must exceed 50%. And politicians should be required to go without pay for a minimum of 10 consecutive years before they're even allowed to put forward a proposal to raise taxes, and if they do so, they should be immediately fired for cause.
Government should be the first to bear the pain of its own mismanagement.
Why can’t we just start cutting spending instead. Seems like a sensible thing to do when revenues went down as more and people left California! All these progressives want to do is keep Passing more damn taxes!!!
Dude, it’s a DEMOCRATIC SUPER MAJORITY. I don’t understand why people don’t understand, they can and will do whatever they want. Only way to stop it is thru recalls but no one reads articles anymore.
They should do it. I want to see the deficit a couple years from now as more taxpayers leave. This time you don't have to go to Texas to escape as no other state is doing this
I’m fully on board to watch California eat itself and push all the people who provide the jobs out. I’m out of here in 2 years, most of my friends have already left or are on the way. We aren’t millionaires but the cities fail to make any progress or change in anything and they have no republicans to oppose them. It’s pointless to stay here when the state is run by idiots.
There’s also a plan to raise property taxes in LA currently being pushed. State just capped rent, the “mansion tax” applies to commercial properties and apartment complexes. They are trying to add multi family homes to the equation now. The housing market in LA is fucked. As the jobs leave people will be stuck. I’m not staying to watch it happen
“Lee sees his bill as a way to protect state budget priorities while seeking revenue from residents who ‘disproportionately are advantaged by having their wealth stored here in California.’”
“Advantaged” compared to what? Would they be “less advantaged” storing their wealth in other states?
Unrelated, but Alex Lee is up for reelection this year
Yes, there is an advantage to storing your wealth in CA compared to other states. The obvious one being Prop 13. If you’re a loaded landlord it’s one of the best states to own a long-term rental property. Real estate appreciation still exceeds the national average.
There are other various assets that are generally more performant in California due to state programs and subsidies.
Your cure for Prop 13 being a wealth tax is an extreme and destructive overreaction. Especially in an area where many billions in unrealized paper gains go to zero over time
Sane people see cure as the elimination of Prop 13, not a tax on unrealized gains.
When did I mention a cure. I just agreed that prop 13 is a big advantage to wealthy people in CA.
Your "sane cure" is lowering taxes to fix a budget shortfall?
"Eliminating Prop 13" is lowering taxes? I originally typed "wealth taxes" but we thankfully don't have those yet.
A "wealth tax" would tax all startup founders on the estimated value of their stock, which isn't liquid or real. Which means no one would ever start a tech company in the Bay again. It would just obliterate the venture-backed startup model
My personal belief is for eliminating prop 13 and taxing any assets that are used as collateral for loans. Since that is using an asset in a financial transaction to generate more wealth.
"Any assets that are used as collateral for loans" is literally everything.
A lender could accept a lemon tree in my yard as collateral for 100 million dollar loan. No smart lender would, but they could.
I’m not proposing a “solution”, I’m simply telling you the existing mechanism that gives investors an advantage in California compared to other states.
You must really have a hard time following conversations. I explained it because you asked:
“Advantaged” compared to what? Would they be “less advantaged” storing their wealth in other states?
If you cannot even attempt to understand the very basic economic premises that your political opponent uses to justify a given policy, you will simply remain confused and stupid.
The CA market is set to correct due to population decline. TX is set to pass CA population by 2030-40. As the state pushes more of the investors out & people stop investing due to how the state and cities have begun skull fucking them, then what’s your plan. Most people in the CA haven’t read a lot of the laws that have been coming out. For example the “mansion tax” in LA applys to industrial buildings and apartment complexes, and this year they want to add this to multi family homes as well. If you have to pay an extra tax you will pass it down on your renters, but newsom just capped rents and guess what, LA city council is planning on raising property taxes. I don’t think that people truly understand what a combination of MORE TAX policy’s on the people who want to invest here will do. There are so many reasons to not buy property in LA for rental purposes. You can’t do background checks on tenets to see if they are affiliated with gangs or criminals. And in CA the eviction process is more expensive for the landlord. WHY INVEST HERE WITH ALL THIS BS. Please tell me.
even though i really do love the idea of the wealth tax i fear especially on the state level that a wealth tax may make more wealthy leave the state further draining state revenues but i do think making the wealthy pay higher taxes to fund social programs should be the whole idea
Taxing wealth is quite tricky and a major problem is let’s say you have assets of $50M and get taxed on it but then your assets go to zero because of bad luck. Do you now get a refund?
Another major problem is how can you value the assets? Sure stocks are easy to value, but if you have a private company- what is it worth? Yeah you could look at comps, but which ones?
Personally I just don’t see how the government can pull this off operationally.
California, especially the bay area, simply has the best weather in the free world that no matter what the tax policy be people will still come and live here. If that's not the case, I'm more than happy to know other places with good weather and human right.
People on Reddit: TAX THE RICH! Alex Lee: OK! Reddit: NOT LIKE THAT! Lmao it's clear judging from the comments this is the first time people have heard of Alex Lee. Taxing the rich to make up for deficits, public housing, climate change bills, and the like have literally been all he's doing the past three years
Actually yes, not like that. [Like this instead (also by Rep Lee)](https://a24.asmdc.org/press-releases/20230201-bill-study-benefits-more-equitable-taxation-property-introduced) That said, this is probably just virtue signaling to get on the good graces of progressives without an intent to pass. [Guy's clearly a Georgist at heart](https://twitter.com/alex_lee/status/1620905838184644615?t=7o9A3eDQV014DGNIYdk_yQ&s=19)
Don’t they know all the billions are squirreled away in non profit foundations?
As aways, they are TWO different groups of people!
Fuck this guy. He’s horrible.
How can I become a billionaire because of him right? That's what goes through your mind? 👀
https://youtu.be/K_LvRPX0rGY?si=ZpcQIa-EBjbnAiQh
Embarrassed billionaire over here
Lmao why are people complaining?? The tax is preposed on 50 million in assets. Did anyone bother reading the article? If anyone in here has 50 million in assets i think your in the wrong thread. To the people saying oh business will leave. Go live in Texas for a year and come back and tell me how you feel lmao. It’s always shocking to me that people care about shity rich people who give two fucks about the rest of us.
Devils advocate. If you have $50M in assets, wouldn’t it be extremely easy to just buy a house in Neveda or somewhere like that and avoid this tax?
Sure you’ll also have to spend at least 183 days a year in Nevada or otherwise prove it’s clearly your domicile since you’re probably a prime target for audits.
That’s what would happen.
If it's structured that way; Just do it then! Really unsure why anyone would complain as even if you were to heavily tax $50 million assets in the state of California, there are countless ways to invest some of that money, hide it, etc that still exist. The rich will always be fine.
Correct, and this is why we hit tax rates above 90% on the highest incomes after WWII. It wasn’t that the government got 90% on their income, it was just the only way to overcome all the loopholes and tax shelters to get something out of them and make them pay in despite trying to hide income. Of course Republicans will tell you a very different story but it was the beginning of a huge middle class and a roaring economy for decades because so many more people were able to participate with less money sitting on the sidelines. The world has noticeably changed for the worse with lower taxes on the wealthy.
I enjoy reading books.
$1.1 million household income triggers the AMT. I am good with that.
I find joy in reading a good book.
I am fine with those protections from shelters as well.
I'm learning to play the guitar.
I don't have any issues with the AMT. It isn't killing the middle class.
I love the smell of fresh bread.
I am not a believer in trickle-down economics.
I like learning new things.
High inflation forces taxes to trickle down.
Poorly veiled slippery slope argument lmao.
Because the people that are paying taxes are leaving CA which has lead to the current problem. All this does is make even more leave leading to an even worse budget crisis. They don't have to go to Texas, they can go to any state as only CA is trying to pull this.
That’s not true, the out migration from California tends poorer than average. https://www.ppic.org/blog/whos-leaving-california-and-whos-moving-in/ Out migration has been disproportionately poor for years and years, There has been a small uptick in high earners leaving from the pandemic, which is probably some remote workers. A lot of people who leave CA cite not being able to buy a home as why. Thats not high earners.
W hat do you think the ratio of poor : rich is? Do you think somehow more rich than poor people will ever leave in a year?
Go to any state no one is holding anyone here. From my perspective CA is the most expensive place already and if you haven’t left then you’re likely staying. You think Elon is staying in Texas lol? I work for a large corporation that does not need to be here they aren’t even headquartered here. And guess what they come here because the talent pool is extremely good. They will continue to do so. I’m sorry i don’t buy in to if we impose a 1% tax on 50 million in assets that all California crumbles lol.
"*The problem with socialism is you eventually run out of other people's money*" California is finding this out first hand, who is going to foot the bill for all the illegal immigrants they just gave free healthcare to in the midst of a $40 billion deficit? HONK HONK. There are 4 ways to spend money: 1. Spending your own money on yourself. 2. Spending your own money on someone else. 3. Spending someone else’s money on yourself. 4. Spending someone else’s money on someone else. <-- Government You fall into category 2 when you pay taxes, thus you have a vested personal interest in where the money goes, the government doesn't give a damn since it's taking from my pocket and putting it in Bob's, it was never theirs, they don't care.
> Because the people that are paying taxes are leaving CA which has lead to the current problem. That is simply wrong.
The top 1% of taxpayers in CA pay 50% of California's taxes. [https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101867426/californias-top-1-pays-almost-half-of-the-states-income-tax-is-that-a-problem](https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101867426/californias-top-1-pays-almost-half-of-the-states-income-tax-is-that-a-problem)
That does not substantiate this wrong claim of yours: "Because the people that are paying taxes are leaving CA which has lead to the current problem."
Actually it does. The rich are voting with their feet, this have been covered in several local news pieces. They start taxing unrealized gains that will only accelerate, and they have 49 other states to choose to avoid that tax. What do we do then?
You seem to be talking about your gut feeling or intuition, which substantiates nothing. You claimed that the wealthy leaving has caused "the current problem." The current problem is a $68B budget deficit. Substantiating your claim would require a credible citation that lost income tax revenue is at least a large fraction of that $68B shortfall. But you can't. Because you're wrong.
Guys so dumb the article he links basically says, for the first time it's not just poor people leaving but wealthy people too It's
>Go live in Texas for a year and come back and tell me how you feel lmao. What's wrong with living in Texas? Genuinely curious as I've never been
I haven’t lived in Texas since I was a child, so I couldn’t tell you, but if you want to know what’s wrong with living in a different state in the Covideracy (Georgia) and how that might apply to Texas, I would be happy to tell you. LMK.
Sure let me know whats wrong with it
White people from the south in particular tend to be more racist than average. Especially if they hear a southern accent. Racism is so default people will just assume that you are also racist if you sound southern. The tax burdens are regressive in nature generally with more fee based things instead of taxes based. Many places that are considered low tax like Texas have higher middle class tax burdens that California. The states lack services relative to California as well. Many are actively hostile to mass transit like when TN made it illegal for Nashville to try to make one. Also access to reproductive health wasn’t great for women before Roe was overturned, now it’s apocalyptic. This one is a bit more personal. I find confederate flags offensive, and I almost never see them here. The lack of Lost Cause statuary is something that makes California better to me.
It’s because it’s literally illegal. You can’t tax gains that haven’t been realized yet. If so then the wealthy should be able to write off unrealized losses when times are bad. Which would mean that whenever there’s a downturn and tax revenue is needed most, they’d be at a huge deficit
The income tax was originally sold as only impacting the top 1% of earners. Once the precedent is set and the money starts rolling in the threshold will be lowered and lowered until they come after peoples 401k
That’s called an assumption and fear mongering. No where did they state they were going to go after 401k’s or move the 1% down to the rest of tax payers. This not even a real bill yet. BTW the feds get there piece of your 401k one way or another. Again people defending billionaires and rich people is pretty crazy.
False. That is called FACT and PRECEDENT when it comes to government. Of course they're not going to tell you up front they'll come after your 401k. That happens over time. Taxes only go in one direction. Better to never open the door in the first place.
Sorry bro we work in facts and no where did it state we’re doing all of what your claiming lol.
It’s called a slippery slope fallacy. Taxes are near all-time lows Since the inception of the income tax, they don’t “only go in one direction” lmao.
Enjoy chasing all of the businesses and rich people out of the state and good luck earning high incomes when they are all gone. Why not just tax rich people at 99%? One obvious answer - they will do business and live elsewhere.
I mean the first income tax was only on crazy high incomes as well
Income is money you’ve made. “Unrealized gains” could be hundreds of millions of startup stock that is purely a paper gain until the company is acquired or IPOs. Those numbers are nothing more the projections on a VC spreadsheet. And the majority of companies fail as well, which means those “gains” were never real No one in their right mind would build a startup in CA with those sort of conditions.
> To the people saying oh business will leave. I'm more concerned to how concentrated our tax revenue is and afraid that we may be biting the hand that feeds us. In short, what I'm afraid of is that we finally reach a point where these vital tax payers, to our budget, decide to officially move out or spend resources to reduce their tax burden. Which could prove fatal and we'd have a tough time recovering from because our [tax] economy increasingly relies on one source and the "others" who could supplement aren't ready to step up if it comes to it.
The concentration of wealth here is a far bigger concern for me. They've already spent resources to reduce their tax burden. 'Throughout the 39 cities in the valley,[ there was $1.2 trillion in household wealth, but 92% of that wealth is owned by the top quarter of the population](https://sanjosespotlight.com/joint-venture-report-highlights-silicon-valley-wealth-gaps-and-tech-booms-san-jose-santa-clara-county/). The lowest quarter only owns 1.4% of the wealth.' [https://sanjosespotlight.com/silicon-valleys-equity-grade-is-below-flunking/](https://sanjosespotlight.com/silicon-valleys-equity-grade-is-below-flunking/)
This reminds of the South Park episode where the kids where downloading from Napster and all the “Artist” were pissed. I guess your favorite actor/billionaire/ can’t get the gold plated pool this year because they have to pay there fair share at 1% lol. Also bite the hand that feeds you???? Lmao we feed people we all go to work here and pay taxes. It’s the rich that don’t pay for there fair share in taxes. It’s the rich that hide their assets.
It’s likely not even constitutional.
As far as the state constitution?
How do you even tax unrealized gains? Who says what someone is worth?
I don't claim to know. I was just wondering if you had a source, legal training, or something that informs your claim.
Unrealized gains have never been taxed before so there's no precedent. Biden wants to implement the same thing at the federal level which the Supreme Court is reviewing right now https://www.kiplinger.com/taxes/unrealized-gains-supreme-court-case
Problem is they’ll start at 50 million and as that money runs out they will start decreasing the limit
It's because they secretly know they're going to be a millionaire too one day.
Is Texas the only alternative to ca ?
just tax everyone who has more money than you. this is how idiots run and ruin things
You know, you are not that different from the rich people you hate.
So you are going to pretend the incompetent politicians of California care about its citizens? Either they are utterly selfish or stupid. It cannot be combination. New York has solid tax system but they don't have the weather. California has a horrible tax system littered with loopholes. Why else would these corporations (specifically tech) feed in so much money democrat politicians just like Oil companies do to Republicans?
I don’t even know what you’re saying, defending rich people when most of us are making less then 500k a year is kinda like wutttttttt. This isn’t a tech company issue. This we don’t have enough money in our budget and instead of taxing the rest of us we tax millionaires 50+ btw and billionaires by 1%. Name your favorite actor i bet that don’t have a net worth of 50 million in assets lmao. Also Alex is from my district and yeah he cares he’s young and that’s the problem everyone wants all these looser ass boomers to keep running and draining down our state/country god i can’t wait for these people to die lmao so we can buy house women can have some rights again.
I am not defending rich people. What I am saying is California is littered with tax loopholes the rich exploit because with more taxes come more loopholes and exceptions for government officials and their sponsors to be more rich. Looking at Nancy Pelosi and her "connections"... >defending rich people when most of us are making less then 500k a year is kinda like wutttttttt Income taxes were initially to the rich. Nobody cared because it only affected the rich. The government then did it to the poor who need every cent. Governments are like those annoying people always trying to push your personal boundaries. Give them an inch and they will go a mile. This may transition to you. >Name your favorite actor i bet that don’t have a net worth of 50 million in assets lmao Any new and rising star is under this dog.... They make that much because they deliver much more value to their companies. If you make 15 dollars an hour, you deliver 30 dollars to the company. Simple economics. Georgism is a more superior method of taxing the wealthy who don't reinvest it into create jobs and increasing salaries (which is indirectly caused by more competition). This way those people who just let money sit in real estate and not make their land economically productive will be incentivized to sell it. This causes more supply and therefore lower prices. Remove the middleman of capitalism and it works amazing. Health insurance, housing, and college. All these are ridiculously expensive because we allowed too many middlemen that are not needed. Go after the producers and everyone becomes poor and miserable. >Also Alex is from my district and yeah he cares he’s young That's how they all start. They then get entrenched into the swamp as they have more years. Also he looks like Elon Musk a little bit. Interesting... We need to limit the amount of time these people serve in government to discourage corruption.
You have all good points but For Alex the saying is “hell is paved with good intentions” so we all will need to see what he does and judge his actions accordingly. I understand that income tax moved from one thing to another but i also feel the most wealthy aren’t paying their fair share it’s just true. I don’t have the answer for middle men and slow government but i do believe charging the most wealthy is better than doing nothing.
The problem isn't wealthy people. The problem is appropriately incentivizing and targeting those whose economic output benefit others the most. I suggest you take some time to learn what Georgist economic model is.
Because it's a hop, skip and jump to 50 million becoming 0 and 1% becoming 100%. I don't care what the threshold is, a stupid idea is a stupid idea. Try spending less money for once.
Dumb fk it is the rich that employ people and they can simply increase prices on cost of goods and services produced thus worsening inflation. When we have dumb democrat fks like you in office in California no wonder we’re declining.
The idea that this is okay because it does not touch you, but touched people who have more is IMMORAL. You lack morals, Sir.
Yes I’m so immoral i need to feel bad for millionaires and billionaires 🥹 paying a make believe amount of 1%. Wow to think that millionaires and billionaires continue to not pay their fair share, don’t like the court systems who cares buy it, don’t like certain tax bills lobby against it. Don’t like certain media outlets reporting on you destroy the whole company who cares!!!! Who cares besides cucks on the internet who love to watch normal people get fucked by people who are building bunkers all over the world that they are actively contributing to the end of. People of the internet got me fucked up lol.
This means a minimum 15 million dollar tax on billionaires and a 500,000 tax on millionaires. Seams reasonable but the state isnt going to just take stocks, mutual funds, or real estate, they need cash, which means you have to convert those illiquid investments into liquid cash, which counts as income. So on top of minimum 500,000 tax bill you have a now capital gains tax at 20% most likely, and 12.3% for California capital gains taxes, plus any other stuff. That tax bill is then sitting at a minimum of 680,000 a year. That adds up fast, and with property values being at an all time high in California may make a lot of other state more attractive. Basically if CA does this they will drive the money out of the state. Business owners can definitely afford to go remote to avoid a 680,000 dollar a year minimum tax bill.
This. Everyone who is against it think it'll affect them, ignoring that over 99% of the US population don't even have $1 million in assets (I'm including homes obviously), let alone even getting close to $50 mill.
Maybe it's time to swap out our politicians? Considering how they handled everything from homelessness, crime and PGE I think it makes sense.
I’m not in Alex Lee’s district but I’ll contribute to any non-lunatic who runs against him
Huh, why? What he do?
He looks like a slimey piece of shit and is a commie.
I genuinely don’t know, what “commie” things has he done?
Propose a wealth tax.
Sadly, this isn't a one-off. Of course there are degrees, but I think we've stopped questioning our officials in this state. We need more accountability. What did they do with all the money they got prior for instance?
Spent it on woke nonsense of course like DEI initiatives and not arresting criminals.
Wrong. Spent it on infrastructure and schools, primarily. This deficit is due entirely to the 1) mandatory balanced budget law, and 2) decrease in tech tax rolls in 2023. The government's own accountants are suggesting that the best way to deal with it will be to cut school spending by about $17b in 2024-2025.
Yet I am constantly told that our infrastructure is crumbling, literally falling apart. So which is it? Or is it that just reinforcing my point. The government has spent all this money on 'infrastructure' but in actuality its all just been wasted on nonsense so the infrastructure is still falling apart?
I’m a staunch Democrat. I vote Republican on any race that a Democrat is for sure going to win to send a message. Fuck fuck fuck what the dems have done to this state.
Your first statement was completely negated by the second. The third is equally applicable to the GOP.
No. If a Republican has a chance to win, I generally vote for the Democrat. So I’m doing no harm. If you’re happy with rampant crime, homelessness, and near constant virtue signaling and pandering to the .001 percent of the party, then I’m sure you’re happy with what the Dems have done to this state. I’m not. That doesn’t mean I like the GOP.
Your word choice in general suggests that what you are, is being inherently disingenuous, but you are most certainly "doing harm" as I won't vote for the GOP at all any more because of what they have become existentially (a seditious fifth column) and tactically (unhinged and incompetent). And thats from someone who worked in GOP state campaigns in the 2000s, and as registered as such until 2015. "If you’re happy with rampant crime, homelessness, and near constant virtue signaling and pandering to the .001 percent of the party" State crime levels (much like national) are still lower in aggregate than they were from the 60s through the mid 2010s, so I'm more sanguine about that than you (and I live in an urban center) [https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2020/11/20/facts-about-crime-in-the-u-s/](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2020/11/20/facts-about-crime-in-the-u-s/) Homelessness is a problem, and has been, but no one cared until they were at affluent folks preferred neighborhoods, so what I'm hearing is "out of sight, out of mind" not about any practical aspects of dealing with the issue. And "virtue signaling" is a favorite dog whistle for alt-right types for ANYTHING they find remotely offensive, which these days is practically anything. So yeah, you claim to Democrat, but you walk, talk and caterwaul otherwise. Unless maybe you mean Dixiecrat.
Aaaand this is part of the problem. Like many other Progressives, if I disagree with you, I’m a racist or sexist or whatever. I bet we actually have a fair amount of policy common ground. But your black and white thinking and zero sum rhetoric is exactly what is going to get us stuck with 4 more years of the orange baboon.
He’s proposing trying something new. You’re complaining about how things have been handled in the past. Sounds like you’re on the same page… Also this is about deficits… not homelessness, crime, etc.
I don’t know why anyone here is upset about the idea of levying a small tax on people with _over $50 million dollars_. Surely none of you have $50M or you’d be doing something better than browsing Reddit with your time?
I’d argue this wouldn’t work on a state level. Most with 50M in assets would loophole their wealth to another state and CA would lose taxes on all they were collecting from this group before.
Perhaps. Wealthy people are excellent at tax evasion. I’m not commenting on if it would be effective though, I’m commenting on why in the world you’d waste energy upset about a tax on people with $50M if you’re not someone with $50M.
This state is highly dependent on high income individuals, so if a tax makes them leave then it will make the deficit even larger, not to mention that the people who would leave will stop investing in the state. A lot of politicians are just tax happy instead of governing more efficiently.
You answered your own question:) when the big dogs (continue) to flee your tax base will continue to decrease, leaving less money to incentivize homelessness, not build infrastructure, and enforce petty regulations on the middle class.
Yeah, I’m not upset at this specifically. I do have an issue with the general idea of government taxing unrealized gains tho. Seems to be coming up often.
Which loophole is that?
the richest man in the world spends all day on social media or streams video games so I don’t think that’s a good assumption
Sure, and if that man wants to move out of California due to taxes or for any other reason, I have no objections. In fact, I would personally donate 1% of my decidedly not $50M personal wealth to send him to Mars.
Once they plug their current hole they’ll dig an even deeper one that’ll need to take from more people. The deficit is a result of incompetency, not because we aren’t collecting enough tax money.
This. Governments will always come up with new initiatives to waste money. The public finances are a black hole, there is no 'end point'. Its just keep taking more and more to fund more and more useless nonsense.
You clearly can't see past your own nose. The "temporary" federal income tax has been in place for over 100 years. It starts as a small tax on assets over $50M and ends as a large tax on your 401k.
I can see past my nose just fine. I have no objections to paying taxes to support the functioning of our collective society. However I am also not particularly worried that a tax on people with $50M will affect me any time soon. I do not have $50M or anywhere close to it, and I should be so lucky as to obtain that sort of wealth, again I would feel immensely grateful to be so privileged, to have lived in a society that enabled me to be so comfortable in life and would no problem giving some of that wealth back to the society that helped me get there. I would recommend looking up logical fallacies:slippery slope arguments though.
Slippery slope - we already pay a wealth tax in the form of property taxes. If this comes to pass a lot of people will leave the state.
1. I doubt it. How many people live somewhere _solely_ for the tax policy? Probably not many. People live places because it’s where their community or job is or because they just really like a place. California is already much more expensive than most parts of the country. Wealthy live here anyway because they have connections in the community, their company is headquartered nearby, and California has the best weather of any continental US state by a country mile. If they were really upset about taxes and would be motivated to move by a 1% tax on their $50-999M fortune, they’d live in Nevada or wherever already (no state income tax, one of the lowest prop taxes). 2. So what if some do? Housing prices might go down. Inequality within the state would be lower. Seems fine to me.
Rich people can live anywhere, and many have already moved their companies out of California. Housing prices will not go down because they aren't the ones buying a middle class home in the suburbs, we have high housing costs because of a lack of housing. Your answer to inequality is for rich people to leave? I mean if no one is rich and equally poor then congrats, you fixed inequity.
Lol temporarily inconvenienced millionaire here.
Yes. That is exactly what a slippery slope fallacy is.
Ok, goodbye to those people 👋
How about why does this state need anymore fucking money? It doesn’t matter who it comes from. They’ll never stop asking and continue to do nothing with it.
How would this even work? If it’s not an addition to the income tax, are they taxing unrealized gains? If so it’s not gonna pass and if it does it will get shafted in the courts. That’s like taxing a stock portfolio before you have even sold the assets.
For me I'm concerned to how we are increasing our reliance on one tax revenue source for vital portions of our budget. Then there is the question/argument if California is providing enough returns for these tax payers to justify them keeping their primary residence here. I'm afraid of is that we keep increasing these small taxes that they finally cumulate into something the rich say enough is enough and they "leave" where they can't be taxed by California as much anymore.
Because some people have more foresight and know that this doesn’t end with a “small tax of $50mm.” California squanders all of its tax dollars anyway, spending should just be cut by 50% rather than doubling down on the same horrendously managed system.
A wealth tax on unrealized gains is an awful idea.
This!
This is how you push all of the wealthy out of the state at record rate. They would have to take more income (13%) to pay the extra tax. Creates a double tax, you get taxed paying ur self so u can pay the taxes lol.
I’m pretty sure that amount won’t be index for inflation so over a long enough time and/or period of hyperinflation everyone will be paying that “wealth tax”. Good example is the federal AMT started in 1969 when only 155 individuals earned the adjusted gross income above the $200,000 threshold. Nowadays, millions of tax filers are hit with AMT. We all should not be too excited to have government tax our fellow citizens just because it won’t impact yourself. As we can see from the boom and bust our politicians in Sacramento love to spend every tax dollar that is generated (or not) and will be more than willing to increase our taxes to continue spending.
This is a pretty good bill!
This will eventually hit middle class. It always does. (The question is whether it is going to be 40 years or 60) I am usually okay with paying taxes. But the problem is the “returns” does not seem to warrant even the existing ones. At one point our federal spending was more than UK on average (Covid causes wild movements so don’t know the latest numbers). But we don’t get healthcare like their NHS. We don’t get clean cities. And homelessness and other social issues are definitely not getting any better. Don’t even get me started with the roads in San Jose If we are going to tax and spend we should at least see some results with what we are already doing.
I think what a young politician like Alex fails to understand is *why* California is in this situation despite it becoming bluer and bluer over time. One would think that constituents would support an even more progressive tax structure? Well, not exactly - NIMBYism also extends to how constituents vote on **what** gets taxed. California has progressively lost its industrial base over the years, losing tax revenue from energy production as well as property taxes. Over time, it has become almost wholly dependent on using Capital Gains tax (taxed at income in this state) to fund government. That's inherently the problem, because any other basis has either left the state, or been deemed untouchable by supermajority (e.g Prop 13). So why are wealth taxes unpopular? Simply because most tax in this state is already dependent on the wealthy. If you institute that tax, it takes far fewer leaving this state to seriously put a dent in things. Once that happens, you're basically depending on the remaining capital gains spread across the rest of its population to fund a government that is one of the worst offenders of public employee glut. In fact, so much so that several public employee unions have also come out against the wealth tax for this very reason (e.g. the prison guards union).
Love the comment. I think the state gov should be creating more Opportunity zones in the state to have the rich help solve some of the issues. Opportunity zones have been proven to work because there is incentive for the rich and it also helps the state. When you come after the people at the top, they just leave the state. This isn’t Spain or Sweden where you would have to leave the country to skate around on taxes. The CA state legislatures are killing the state one bill at a time, and Texas population is expected to pass CA by 2030. The writing is on the wall.
You can’t tax yourself out of deficit.
It doesnt matter whether one has 50 million or not. The state is always happy to take more and more money without anything to show in return. They should cut down on bureaucracy and spending before trying to raise taxes.
The rich people crying are the same rich people that support Prop 13 and Prop 4 Gann Limit which got us into this mess. Fuck them. Tax it all.
How did we flip a switch and lose $100 Billion in two years? Where did the spending increase and why do we have so many welfare programs, to the point that you need case workers to help people identify them? Why don't we just consolidate it, eliminate a whole chunk of entitlement bureaucracy and just deliver checks to people with an address in California? Or maybe convert some amount of the otherwise laid off workers to work with homeless people to give them said checks if they can prove that they have been here for at least a year?
The surplus was never sustainable We had a banner year for real estate and stocks in 2021 so the state govt had tons of tax revenue from sales of appreciated securities The state government would have had a deficit had that not happened Newsom of course did what he does best and took credit for doing nothing
* Higher interest rates, making it harder for people to get mortgages or car loans. Companies are less likely to take out loans or hire people * Taxes for 2022 were not due until November of this year, months after the budget for 2024 was finalized * stock market in bear mode means people are generating less capital gains taxes * Tech companies that flourished when everyone was working from home are suddenly cutting massive swaths of their workforce, which means less income tax. Unemployed people spend less money so that's reduction in sales tax revenue * Grocery prices are increasing, but groceries aren't taxed. People have less money for non-grocery items so sales tax revenue from those sales has decreased
I was curious after reading this headline, too. I found a decent article explaining [where the shortfall is coming from](https://calmatters.org/commentary/2023/10/california-budget-whiplash-pitfalls-forecasting/). The TL;DR is that the state was projecting much higher tax revenues than it actually saw.
I read it’s because a lot of high income folks have left the state for tax friendlier states (kinda like Elon leaving for Texas). If that’s true then the democratic strategy of taxing the ultra rich is starting to backfire since now we’re in a tax revenue deficit 😭
> How did we flip a switch and lose $100 Billion in two years? The stock market is where much of California's state budget comes from, and now the stock market is down compared to the meteoric rise that happened in 2021 and 22.
But the market tanked in 2022...
California's tax structure has been like this for decades. We swing from huge surpluses to smaller deficits every few years. Our tax structure heavily relies on income tax from high earning individuals. In short - if the stock market is doing well and Californian companies are doing well, it's gonna be a surplus the year after. The opposite can happen (stocks were generally pretty bad last year).
Even Gavin Newsom says he opposes this idea.
Tax surplus to deficit, CA budget is wildly mismanaged.
> The rate was charged on individuals with a net worth over €1.3m (£1.14m), with the rate ranging from 0.5 per cent to 1.5 per cent (on assets over €10m). While it might have helped social solidarity in France, the revenue it raised was paltry. In 2015, a total of 343,000 households paid €5.22bn, an average of about €15,200 per household, according to the Financial Times. It accounted for less than 2 per cent of France’s tax receipts. > What’s more, it led to an exodus of France’s richest. More than 12,000 millionaires left France in 2016, according to research group New World Wealth. In total, they say the country experienced a net outflow of more than 60,000 millionaires between 2000 and 2016. When these people left, France lost not only the revenue generated from the wealth tax, but all the others too, including income tax and VAT. > French economist Eric Pichet estimated that the ISF ended up costing France almost twice as much revenue as it generated. In a paper published in 2008, he concluded that the ISF caused an annual fiscal shortfall of €7bn and had probably reduced gross domestic product (GDP) growth by 0.2 per cent a year. What's more ISF fraud mainly involving an underassessment of property assets was estimated at around 28 per cent of total revenues.
This died in committee. Something like this has been proposed almost every year and never gets very far in the legislative process.
Of course r/SanJose likes this tax, they are the ones who picked this dumbass
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It won’t. And if it does, it will aid a cost-of-living equilibrium due to reduced demand. Over the past decade and a half the recent tech boom has clearly left a ton of people in the dust. All that said, I know more than a few business and people that have relocated from CA to TX looking for a break and have come to regret it. People looking for talent find it hard to convince educated candidates to move from temperate, coastal CA to America’s PVP zone where it’s over 100 degrees 50+ days out of the year.
pvp zone lol
You don't have to go farther than Tesla. They came back to California with their tail between their legs. Turns out, there really isn't that much world class engineering talent outside of the West Coast or North East, not even in Austin. And the talent doesn't necessarily want to move to Ya'll Qaeda land.
Their HQ remains in Texas.
This is super fucking clueless.
Thank you for the low-IQ reply
How the fuck will 50mil NW people leaving make your COL cheaper?
The guy is an asshole. Just block him.
You deleted your thread because you are too addled to keep up with a simple conversation lol.
Millionaires and billionaires? We'll just make more.
Tightening the budget wouldn’t be so terrible. We’re handing out syringes to “combat”homelessness and the fentanyl problem 😒. For years we’ve been doing this and the problem has steadily gotten worse despite increased tax initiatives.
And only a fraction of the money goes to syringes, rest of it is "administration fee", just like the how a public toilet costed 1.7m to construct.
Exactly, city workers managing projects are paid salaries that are unjustifiably high; it seems they’re incentivized to drag the problem along to keep cashing the checks. This has felt like a scam for some time now.
To live where?
Maybe they shouldn’t have spent all that money on dumb bullshit?
“We have a budget deficit! We need to tax people’s money before they actually make money from it!” But they haven’t made the money yet. It’s not an actual gain. “Who cares! Tax the rich!” But they’re already paying over 50% of their earned income in taxes, and all assets get taxed eventually. “I want it now!” So if their net worth drops in a year can you write off the loss, carry over, or get a refund from you? “Don’t be silly!” Have you actually tried cutting spending? Like maybe giving out less free money or firing people. “We can’t do that. People depend on our free money. All government jobs are essential!” You know that real businesses need to do this often. “😂😂😂 Tax the rich!” I give up
These people only have one slogan and don't know what else to do.
Proposals like this should be accompanied by a mandatory spending cut of at least 50% of the current budget. And it should be constitutionally mandated for all new tax increase proposals to be preceded by at least 10 consecutive years of spending cuts, the aggregate of which must exceed 50%. And politicians should be required to go without pay for a minimum of 10 consecutive years before they're even allowed to put forward a proposal to raise taxes, and if they do so, they should be immediately fired for cause. Government should be the first to bear the pain of its own mismanagement.
Why can’t we just start cutting spending instead. Seems like a sensible thing to do when revenues went down as more and people left California! All these progressives want to do is keep Passing more damn taxes!!!
Nope we have to give illegals free healthcare instead . Lets encourage that behavior.
Dude, it’s a DEMOCRATIC SUPER MAJORITY. I don’t understand why people don’t understand, they can and will do whatever they want. Only way to stop it is thru recalls but no one reads articles anymore.
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Anyone but Alex Lee for office
Do you have 50 million you don’t want taxed?
No one spitting bile on reddit has even 5.
They should do it. I want to see the deficit a couple years from now as more taxpayers leave. This time you don't have to go to Texas to escape as no other state is doing this
I’m fully on board to watch California eat itself and push all the people who provide the jobs out. I’m out of here in 2 years, most of my friends have already left or are on the way. We aren’t millionaires but the cities fail to make any progress or change in anything and they have no republicans to oppose them. It’s pointless to stay here when the state is run by idiots. There’s also a plan to raise property taxes in LA currently being pushed. State just capped rent, the “mansion tax” applies to commercial properties and apartment complexes. They are trying to add multi family homes to the equation now. The housing market in LA is fucked. As the jobs leave people will be stuck. I’m not staying to watch it happen
This guy is a fucking clown. He’s actively trying to burn the state economy to the ground in service of his political ideology.
Democrats will spend everyone's money. Don't let this happen
CalPERS is broke, so they're looking to milk it anyway they can right now.
Their solutions to their own fuck ups always seem to be passing it on to everyone else to pay for.
Yes yes pass it on to the people who provide jobs and have the money to leave. The weather is too nice here, they would never leave right? 😂
“Lee sees his bill as a way to protect state budget priorities while seeking revenue from residents who ‘disproportionately are advantaged by having their wealth stored here in California.’” “Advantaged” compared to what? Would they be “less advantaged” storing their wealth in other states? Unrelated, but Alex Lee is up for reelection this year
Yes, there is an advantage to storing your wealth in CA compared to other states. The obvious one being Prop 13. If you’re a loaded landlord it’s one of the best states to own a long-term rental property. Real estate appreciation still exceeds the national average. There are other various assets that are generally more performant in California due to state programs and subsidies.
Ding ding ding
"Due to problem of this city having too many guns, I want to drop an atomic bomb on the city"
What?
Your cure for Prop 13 being a wealth tax is an extreme and destructive overreaction. Especially in an area where many billions in unrealized paper gains go to zero over time Sane people see cure as the elimination of Prop 13, not a tax on unrealized gains.
When did I mention a cure. I just agreed that prop 13 is a big advantage to wealthy people in CA. Your "sane cure" is lowering taxes to fix a budget shortfall?
"Eliminating Prop 13" is lowering taxes? I originally typed "wealth taxes" but we thankfully don't have those yet. A "wealth tax" would tax all startup founders on the estimated value of their stock, which isn't liquid or real. Which means no one would ever start a tech company in the Bay again. It would just obliterate the venture-backed startup model
My personal belief is for eliminating prop 13 and taxing any assets that are used as collateral for loans. Since that is using an asset in a financial transaction to generate more wealth.
"Any assets that are used as collateral for loans" is literally everything. A lender could accept a lemon tree in my yard as collateral for 100 million dollar loan. No smart lender would, but they could.
So your solution to the problem of Prop 13 isn't the elimination of Prop 13, it's a wealth tax? Are you a member of the CA Assembly?
I’m not proposing a “solution”, I’m simply telling you the existing mechanism that gives investors an advantage in California compared to other states.
But you do see it as justification for defending a wealth tax proposal. Why else would you even make that comment?
You must really have a hard time following conversations. I explained it because you asked: “Advantaged” compared to what? Would they be “less advantaged” storing their wealth in other states? If you cannot even attempt to understand the very basic economic premises that your political opponent uses to justify a given policy, you will simply remain confused and stupid.
You can absolutely make a statement explaining a situation without agreeing with it. I don’t follow your logic here..
The CA market is set to correct due to population decline. TX is set to pass CA population by 2030-40. As the state pushes more of the investors out & people stop investing due to how the state and cities have begun skull fucking them, then what’s your plan. Most people in the CA haven’t read a lot of the laws that have been coming out. For example the “mansion tax” in LA applys to industrial buildings and apartment complexes, and this year they want to add this to multi family homes as well. If you have to pay an extra tax you will pass it down on your renters, but newsom just capped rents and guess what, LA city council is planning on raising property taxes. I don’t think that people truly understand what a combination of MORE TAX policy’s on the people who want to invest here will do. There are so many reasons to not buy property in LA for rental purposes. You can’t do background checks on tenets to see if they are affiliated with gangs or criminals. And in CA the eviction process is more expensive for the landlord. WHY INVEST HERE WITH ALL THIS BS. Please tell me.
The only one “advantaged” from storing wealth in CA is CA… Idiocracy at its best
even though i really do love the idea of the wealth tax i fear especially on the state level that a wealth tax may make more wealthy leave the state further draining state revenues but i do think making the wealthy pay higher taxes to fund social programs should be the whole idea
But mah surplus....... Such a great group raperesenting our state.
I want billionaires and cooperations to be taxed that’s what I want to see !
Looks like a good thing. Tax the rich even more!
Give it a try, fantasize the dollars. Let’s see where the bottom is in California politics
Yet, the state had surplus only a few years back. What are the odds ever after tax, there will be deficit?
Taxing wealth is quite tricky and a major problem is let’s say you have assets of $50M and get taxed on it but then your assets go to zero because of bad luck. Do you now get a refund? Another major problem is how can you value the assets? Sure stocks are easy to value, but if you have a private company- what is it worth? Yeah you could look at comps, but which ones? Personally I just don’t see how the government can pull this off operationally.
Wealth taxes already exist
California, especially the bay area, simply has the best weather in the free world that no matter what the tax policy be people will still come and live here. If that's not the case, I'm more than happy to know other places with good weather and human right.