Winter 2004

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Cal-Tax Commentary

Carol Evans is vice president of the California Taxpayers’ Association.

If you’re one of those people who’s always complaining that taxes are just too darn low, and who can’t wait to write those tax checks every April 15 – here’s some good news.  This year, you won’t have to wait. You can help raise taxes now, by voting for Proposition 56 on March 2.

That’d be the “take my wallet, please” proposition that would make it easier for the Legislature to raise state taxes. Proposition 56 would eliminate the requirement in the state Constitution that all tax increases and all new taxes must be approved by a two-thirds vote of the Legislature.

If Proposition 56 passes, the door is open to higher income taxes, higher sales taxes, even higher property taxes (through a statewide parcel tax). Any and every state tax would be that much easier to increase.

Of course that’s not how the people behind Proposition 56 talk about it. No, they call this “budget accountability” and to prove it, they’ve put in penalties for our elected officials if they don’t pass the state budget on time.

By itself, that would be a good idea. Sacramento needs a dose of real accountability. But giving even more money to the same people who’ve spent us into a deficit already, by making it easier for politicians to raise our taxes – that’s like giving an alcoholic free run of the bar. The last thing Sacramento needs now is a blank check drawn on the people of California.

That’s why the California Taxpayers’ Association, the California Taxpayer Protection Committee, United Californians for Tax Reform, and the largest coalition of taxpayer groups ever seen in California, all oppose Proposition 56, the Blank Check Initiative.

It’s not as if we’ve been stingy in paying our taxes. Californians already fork over $130 billion a year in state and local taxes.

At the same time, our economy is still struggling to get back on its feet. Many working families are working harder than ever just to make ends meet. Many small businesses, which historically are the engine that drives economic growth, are working hard just to stay afloat. Opening the door to a flood of higher taxes is just what we don’t need now.

That’s why the Blank Check Initiative is also opposed by the Small Business Survival Committee, California Retailers Association, the California Restaurant Association, California Farm Bureau Federation, Associated Builders and Contractors of California, Family Winemakers of California, National Federation of Independent Business, Small Manufacturers Association of California, California Chamber of Commerce and other organizations representing just about every sort of business still left here in California.

But maybe you’d like to give our politicians in Sacramento the benefit of the doubt. Just because they can raise taxes, doesn’t mean they will raise taxes, does it?

We don’t have a crystal ball, but we do know these things:

• Even with the existing two-thirds vote requirement, taxes have been steadily going up over the last decade.

• Last year, the Legislature considered new tax and fee increases that totaled almost $65 billion.

• There’s nothing, not a single sentence, in Proposition 56 that does anything to encourage fiscal restraint, that does anything to limit spending or that does anything to direct Sacramento to find any budget solution other than raising taxes.

• (Oh, and we know that nothing is certain but death and taxes.)

The people behind Proposition 56 are trying to deceive the voters, by dressing this up as “budget accountability,” and putting in language to push Sacramento to pass a budget on time.

But they don’t say a word about the single most important change in their measure, and the real aim of Proposition 56 – elimination of the two-thirds approval protection against unjustified tax increases.

Any tax increase should come only after Sacramento has made a clear accounting for how it spends the money we already pay in taxes, and only after it makes a compelling case for why more money is needed. The two-thirds vote gives us that protection. Getting rid of the two-thirds vote, as Proposition 56 would do, also gets rid of any need for bipartisan consensus or thoughtful discussion.

Proposition 56 means higher taxes with no real accountability. It means a blank check for politicians in Sacramento. It means tax increases for working families and struggling businesses. And that means big trouble for California.

Please read this measure carefully, and join us in voting no on the Blank Check Initiative; no on Proposition 56.