2026 California Billionaire Tax | Hacker News Reader

2026 California Billionaire Tax

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15 pointsleonidasrup11 comments

It needs to be a federal tax or they'll just move to another state. Not saying this isn't a good thing, but it won't produce anything until the taxman has teeth in every other state.

This is a myth, perpetuated by the wealthy. Very few people would actually go through the trouble of moving from California. Be serious.

Billionaires are definitely mobile and can easily move states, many already have. It will be hard for a single state to get focused revenue from the really rich, and that federal intervention is required. Parent was right.

The Google founders left

Elon Musk moving to Texas was a myth?

Tax evaders gonna tax evade.

Sure, a couple token public billionaires make a big stink about how they are “moving”, while still maintaining homes and businesses in California. This is for the narrative, with the added bonus of tax fraud that they can and will get away with.

And that seems unrealistic.

IMO we would be better off closing other loopholes:

- various special carve outs (real estate stuff, carried interest, etc)

- enforce the estate tax for real

- ban stock buy backs, make companies return cash via dividends, which are easy to tax

- remove special treatment for capital gains

- hire lots more auditors and lawyers for the IRS to go after high wealth returns, where all the fraud is

I wonder what it would look like if the federal income tax was removed, and instead the amount needed was assigned to the states to produce proportional to population, however they want.

Note that this vote also has to alter the state constitution to permit this kind of tax

If passed it will not be a “one-time” event, it will be a long-term disaster

The ability to tax extremly large accumulated wealth is very positive. Don't forget, bilionares have succesfully exploited weakneses of the current tax laws.

1. Capital Gains Are Favored

2. Dividends Are Tax-Advantaged

3. Payroll Taxes Are a Non-Issue

4. “Buy, Borrow, Die” Strategy

https://www.americans.com/money/see-why-warren-buffett-pays-...

We have to not obly fix the current tax laws, but also fix the results of past tax laws (extreme concetration of wealth and power).

Wealth != income

This amendment creates a new power that is very destructive

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