PROP 1-A is yet another lie to the people of California. More deception to “fix” the budget by the same crew who created this mess.
Prop 1-A imposes a surtax (a tax on top of existing taxes), adding to the sales tax and car tax increases. But we already have the highest sales taxes, the highest income taxes, the highest gas taxes and, yes, the highest property taxes in the U.S. More of the same is not the answer.
The problem is excess spending in Sacramento. In the last four years state spending has increased from $19 billion to nearly $40 billion. We’ve “balanced” our budgets with borrowing from the future and smoke and mirrors. Prop 1-A is a two-year patch sure to be extended indefinitely, which nonetheless will not balance the budget.
We must get control of spending. Since 1999 the Democrat-controlled Legislature has shifted spending from infrastructure to never-ending social programs and ever-increasing pay raises and pensions for public employees.
None of this is sustainable. Prop 1-A is only a Band-Aid over this festering wound. But these same legislators want even more taxes and the elimination of Prop 13 to fund even more spending.
You will hear that California’s property tax rates are in the low to mid-range compared to other states. True, but because of our high property values, the amount one pays is much higher than most other states.
Proposition 13, passed in 1978, limits property taxes to 1 percent a year based on purchase price. By comparison, the rate is 2% in Oregon, but the million-dollar house in Calabasas is worth only $200,000 in Portland so the annual property tax is $10,000 in California versus $4,000 in Portland.
Raising taxes via Prop 1-A during the worst recession since the ’70s will only exacerbate the exodus of middle class Californians, cause even more businesses to fail, and cause larger job losses and unemployment. Bad idea.
Vote No.
Scott Dittrich