Vote | Californians reject billionaire tax

Among others, the left-wing US Senator Bernie Sanders campaigned for the billionaire tax. Photo: Jae C. Hong/AP/dpa Sacramento.  The proposed introduction of a billionaire tax in the US state of California, which had alarmed the tech industry in Silicon Valley, was rejected in the referendum held a week ago in parallel with the congressional and gubernatorial elections. The measure, which was put to the vote as “Proposition 40,” only received 47.2 percent of the vote and thus missed the necessary majority, as the AP news agency reported based on vote counts. Billionaires like Google co-founder Sergey Brin have mobilized more than $300 million for a campaign against the rich tax in recent months and filled the TV schedule with their commercials.

According to the proposal, all California residents with assets of at least one billion US dollars (currently around 890 million euros) should give a one-time five percent of this by the deadline of January 1, 2026. Most of the money should go to the health care system in the Democratically governed state, as there is a risk of funding gaps due to the loss of subsidies from the Republican federal government in Washington.

Advocates of the billionaire tax estimate the levy could have raised around $100 billion. Researchers at Stanford University in Silicon Valley, however, came up with an amount closer to $30 billion.

One reason for their more skeptical assessment is that some of California's super-rich have already taken steps to relocate their official residence away from California. For example, Brin and his Google co-founder Larry Page bought tens of millions of dollars worth of properties in Florida - a Republican stronghold. Critics of the special levy, such as the Democratic Governor of California, Gavin Newsom, warned that the state would lose tax revenue in the future because the rich would leave.

Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg approached the matter differently: he enforced a new share structure at the Facebook group by threatening to move. In a stock split, new shares without voting rights are issued - so Zuckerberg could have sold part of them to pay the tax without losing influence. The co-founder and CEO of the chip company Nvidia, Jensen Huang, said, however, that leaving California because of the tax was out of the question for him.

The levy should also address the problem that it is easy for the super-rich in the US to avoid paying taxes. Their assets often consist of large blocks of shares - and taxes would only be due if they sell some of them. Instead, they often take out loans secured by shares and can therefore live largely tax-free. Advocates of the levy argued that California is home to around 250 billionaires with a total wealth of about $2.3 trillion.  dpa/nd

Other media have corporations or billionaires behind them. We have the nd.Genossenschaft and readers like you. That makes us independent and that’s exactly how we want to remain. But it also means: without you the calculation won't work. We need 300,000 euros by the end of the year.

You can donate directly here, one-time or regularly, so that nd stays.