California proposition to tax billionaires gets onto the November ballot with just one problem: Everyone gets to be the 'billionaire'
A sneaky rider at the bottom of the proposition allows legislators to raise taxes on all Californians with no permission required. A month or two ago, I was at Costco in Mission Valley in San Diego, and saw a disturbing sight: Voters were lining up in front of a proposition table to sign a petition for a so-called "billionaire's tax" to hit anyone with a net worth of $1 billion a one-time five percent tax on their net worth in California, so they claim. Normally, people slink away from these tables to avoid signing. This was different.
It's hard to think of a more disastrous bill and shocking to see that it could be so popular it could probably pass without the usual election cheating. But it's gotten nearly twice the required signatures, so it clearly has significant support and will find itself on the November ballot.
According to CBS News:
Proponents of a proposal to tax California billionaires say they have obtained enough signatures for the measure to appear on the November ballot.
The measure, proposed by Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West (SEIU-UHW), a union representing more than 120,000 California health care workers, would impose a one-time 5% tax on Californians with net worths of $1 billion or more.
The union said it obtained more than 1.5 million signatures, exceeding the 875,000 required to qualify for the ballot.
Called the "2026 Billionaire Tax Act," the statewide ballot measure is intended to prevent hospital and clinic closures across California and help fund public K-14 education and state food assistance programs, according to organizers.
California's voters should be careful what they wish for, because they aren't going to like the result.
For starters, it'll cost the state 100,000 jobs and trash the economy worse than it already is, according to a study cited by the New York Post:
Billionaire tax could kill 100,000 California jobs and sink revenue: study https://t.co/S3IT32Yxen pic.twitter.com/9ndxlqSTBn
— New York Post (@nypost) April 27, 2026
Billionaires fleeing the state will do that to the job market and it's already happening. But that's not the half of it.
Once the billionaires have decided they won't be bilked and leave the state, everyone else is going to get to be the billionaire, according to a couple of sneaky riders buried deep in the bill, and they will be taxed accordingly.
This tech bro, who follows the matter closely as he watches all his buddies flee the state, advised how bad it is:
The Billionaire Tax is actually an Everyone Tax.
— Chamath Palihapitiya (@chamath) April 25, 2026
The Billionaire Tax is a new tax proposal written by four professors who don't believe in the American dream. Some of them aren’t even American…go figure.
Despite its name, it applies to every California resident who currently…
Here's a key passage:
On page twenty-six, it explains how the government can convert to an Everyone Tax without voter approval.
They can also adjust the tax to be a yearly tax, not just one time…again, without your approval.
Here's how the tax would work: As a voter, you're being asked to approve a tax that would require you to:
1. list all your assets and the value of each, then submit them to the California Franchise Tax Board.
2. authorize the tax board to appraise your assets and confirm the value of each.
3. pay a penalty of up to forty percent of your tax bill if the board determines your reported value was too low in their opinion.
4. allow the tax board to subpoena your financial records from every one of your financial institutions for auditing.
This Everyone Tax runs 34 pages of shifty language describing how the government plans to take your assets. Read the fine print and decide for yourself. If this were truly a billionaire tax, it would be 3 pages. It’s 34 pages so that it can create the mechanisms to steal from all of you.
So, own a three-bedroom mid-century modern ranch house valued at $1 million on a scruffy, needs-maintenance street that's turning to gravel? Get ready to fork over that spare $50,000 you've always wanted to give to the California taxman. Undervalue your house, and you'll get fined massively, oh and the state will determine what your home is worth.
Here's how creepy the paperwork will be:
As you go to work today and settle into the week, please study the form below. You will soon need to fill this out EVERY year and tell the government what you own and then allow them to tell you how much its worth.
— Chamath Palihapitiya (@chamath) April 27, 2026
That is the framework that is enabled by the Trojan Horse… pic.twitter.com/Wsr6pYBw8f
They'll take out a lot of little guys on that one.
Anyone who thinks they won't expand this billionaire's tax to all homeowners of any net worth is obviously an idiot. Even Gavin Newsom is against it and that is saying something.
Yet the voters are going for it and the measure appears popular because nobody likes the tech bros who come to mind whenever 'billionaire' is brought up in California, while many seem to think it's the other guy who gets it.
No, this is the greedy hand of the state looking to harvest every last penny from its taxpayers to pay for its ever-expanding government and all its accompanying fraud. If this measure passes, the middle and even low classes will be in for a surprise, a very bad one, and either gone or ruined, with only the illegals to inherit what is left.
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