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California ‘billionaire tax’ makes ballot despite opposition from tech moguls
(www.theguardian.com)
One time? Well I guess it's better than nothing.
this post was submitted on 19 Jun 2026
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I think sending a message of 'look what we can do with just 5% of their wealth' is important, provided anything actually positive comes from those funds.
That's where I'm skeptical. I've worked as a contractor for the state for most of my professional career and am now a state employee. The answer to the question of 'Is there corruption in CA state govt?' is.... well, let's just take the pension fund management application as an example; mycalpers.
I never got a straight answer for just how much that application cost. I don't work there anymore so I doubt I ever will, but the only answer I really trusted is that the total comes to around 800 million.
Let me repeat that with emphasis. 800 million. The best part here is that at least 400 of that 800 million was completely wasted on a first iteration of the app that was scrapped entirely. Thanks to Accenture, who apparently had Sushi Thursdays or some shit during the entire app creation cycle.
You take one look at the app and will realize it should never have cost that much money.
So yes, it's something. Whether that will play out the way you or I think it should is another thing entirely. This is all assuming it even gets passed.
Even if it passes, it will be hung up in courts for years and never end up getting paid.
It's dumb to have a "one time tax fee" retroactive based on where you lived like a year ago. It should just be a yearly tax.
They want the payout but without losing the billionaires. If they make it retroactive and dont make it recurring, the billionaires have less incentive/urgency to leave. They're already on the hook for the one time fee and it isn't an immediate concern that it would happen again. I'm sure that is the logic they're going with. Dunno if that will harm their case when this inevitably goes to court though.
Nothing like the threat of "we've decided once again to take some money from you because you lived here before" to make them not up and move.
Not that they'll bother, because most won't pay it.
I'm doing what I can to spread awareness about this:
There is a potential proposition which claims to be protecting your retirement savings. In actuality, it's designed to nullify the 5% billionaire tax.
Holy fuck, they are already acting quickly and there's no one organizing opposition to this bill.
But they'll leave the state!
Good, get these fucking leeches out of here.
LoL they say the same thing in the UK. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2026/06/18/wealthy-britons-flee-to-isle-of-man-to-escape-tax-raid/
Just need to ensure there's nowhere nice for them to move to.
No, you need to say that moving to a place with lower tax rates leaves you liable for some period after you've left.
There are countries that levy taxes on you as a citizen regardless of where you're living. This is possible.
Just one-time? Why not making it annual?
I don't care what the money goes to. As long as it takes one smidge of power away from them I am in favor.
What if all of that would go to the first Nazi trillionaire?
But seriously, I agree with that sentiment.
Financial obesity is an existential threat to any society that tolerates it, and needs to cease being celebrated, rewarded, and positioned as an aspirational goal.
Corporations are the only ‘persons’ which should be subjected to capital punishment, but trillionaires should be forced to transition into billionaires, and billionaires should be euthanised through taxation.
Tangentially, I'd really love it if people stopped calling rich people "elites." It reaffirms their belief that they're better than the rest of us. Let's stop stroking their egos and call them the leeches they are.
Let’s stop stroking their egos and call them the leeches they are.
Woah there. Leeches are actually important for environment.
Parasites of the Epstein Class is a more apt description of billionaires and the trillionaire.
Elites are not people, they’re groups. More specifically, they’re insular and well-connected groups with outsized power (relative to group population). They share a common interest and they cooperate to further that interest at the expense of the common good. Often these groups are made up of billionaires but they also include the politically connected as well as artists and entertainers/influencers.
That was the older meaning of the word elite, anyway. More recently it’s come to denote individuals with exceptional skill. This version has been pervasive in the sports and gaming communities. I personally wouldn’t worry about the latter definition influencing the former. If you need to clarify, you can use terms like political or business elite.
I think it’s really important for people to not give up on this term because it encompasses more than just wealth. Elites can form in any group, as a breakaway subgroup that works against the interests of the main group. Feminist Jo Freeman wrote a famous paper informed by her experiences witnessing the formation of elites within the feminist movement.
Take the power back!
I did, but I got my posts and comments deleted for my effort
An uprising requires more than simple discontent
Fight the power
we got to fight the power that be!
I’m sure at least one of them could be a billionaire.
Rage Against the Machine
There is a bit of censorship here
More than a bit
Did they model the long term effects of this?
Such proposals have raised predictable outrage from the rich, along with threats that they’ll move elsewhere where taxes are lower and dire predictions that their fellow plutocrats will refuse to move in.
Yet there’s scant evidence for these consequences. In fact, when Massachusetts passed a “millionaires tax” in 2023, conservatives claimed the rich would flee. But two years later, they haven’t — and Massachusetts has collected $5.7 billion for infrastructure and public education. -Robert Reich
I was listening to NPR a day or two ago. They were talking about a shortage of mansions in the Bay Area. While at the same time talking about a lack of affordable housing. We're seeing the long term effects of not taxing wealth appropriately.
Of a one time tax?
Think of the poor billionaires!
The billionaires will be devastated financially with a one time tax!
I heard It would be 25 years before any negative effects would be felt, assuming they leave the state.
Would that mean more room for people that pay taxes
only useful as a election strategy, after it they likely wont entertain another one.