Not only has Gov. Gavin Newsom vocally opposed the proposed California billionaire tax, but he also wants to prevent the state from ever passing a wealth tax in the future.
On Friday he endorsed Proposition 42, a ballot measure that would cancel out Proposition 40, the proposed billionaire tax. Prop. 42 would prohibit retroactive taxes like the one-time 5% tax on assets that would apply to any billionaire who lived in California on Jan. 1, 2026 if Prop. 40 passes.
But Prop. 42, funded and placed on the ballot by billionaire and Google co-founder Sergey Brin to defeat the billionaire tax, also would go further, by banning any new taxes on personal property.
That includes pensions and 401K accounts before retirees start drawing retirement income from them. It also includes other investments, financial assets, business holdings, art collections and all other forms of personal wealth that would be affected by the billionaire tax or any future wealth tax.
Newsom’s decision to support Prop. 42 runs counter to his own Democratic Party and some labor unions. It also aligns him with some of the wealthy tech donors with whom he’s maintained longstanding relationships dating back to his days as mayor of San Francisco.
The proposition for a one-time tax on billionaires, while I hope it does pass, is not the most important prop in this regard. If for no reason other than it’s just a one-time tax. The counter-proposition to ban taxes on “personal property” i.e. wealth is far more impactful long term. We should be taxing wealth and not income. If that prop passes, California will never be able to tax wealth. And frankly I’m worried it will, because Americans just have this reflexive “taxes bad” ideology and will vote for it thinking it means the state will never be able to tax the $15k they have sitting in their Roth IRA or whatever.
And what they consider taxable from personal property and what they don’t is entirely designed to fuck over the poor. They’ll tax your hovel, or your car you use to get to your shitty job, but not your bosses 20 million dollar investment account.