Who Killed California – Proposition 13 etc
Posted: April 21st, 2010 by: h2
This is a nice historical review of just how California was placed into the financial predicament it’s in now, at least partially.
The decimation of the California economy was a long-term project. It began in earnest in 1978 with the passage of the infamous Proposition 13 (the People’s Initiative to Limit Property Taxation). Like the current Proposition 16 (a proposal that protects private utilities while pretending to uphold the right vote), Prop 13 was perhaps the first use of the most brilliant means of circumventing democracy ever devised.
Embodied in the state constitution that appropriately numbered ballot proposition not only set a limit on property taxes at one percent of value but it also made it virtually impossible for the state to raise sales or income taxes by requiring a two-thirds vote in both legislative houses. Since property taxes were the primary source of funding for education, Prop 13 was the poison pill that sickened and eventually killed the future of education in the state once known as golden.
By crippling the state’s revenue raising mechanism it was only a matter of time before economic events would bring California to its knees.
Who Killed California
And so it goes… not that facts will ever alter profoundly ideological right-wing viewpoints, but it’s useful to have them at hand in case you have to actually try to talk to one of them.