You Pay Enough But To The State, It's Never Enough

0:00Welcome to the Howard Jarvis radio show. I'm Susan Shelley with the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, the most influential taxpayer advocacy group in California. We are fighting for you in the legislature, in the courts, and on the ballot. And this year on the ballot, we have Proposition 43, and last something good to vote for. After all, this fighting that we did to stop tax increases, now we have a big yes on 43. What does it do? It protects taxpayers. How does it do it? It restores the two thirds vote requirement for local special taxes, which is in the Constitution. It was in Proposition 13, but the courts have carved out a giant loophole. And we've been fighting this for nine years in the courts. And for some reason, the judges don't care for taxpayers. They just want to take your money. So we've been fighting and fighting, and now we are on the ballot to make it absolutely clear that Prop 13 means what it says.

1:00Local special taxes need a two thirds vote to pass. That's it. That's what's in Prop 43. Yes, on 43 to make it harder to raise your taxes. Very simple. We're fixing a problem that the courts created. We're putting it back the way it's supposed to be. And you can get yard signs, door hackers. You can get all kinds of campaign swag. Just go to yes on 43.com. Yes on 43.com. Fill out that form and we'll get you whatever you want. We're trying to deliver signs all over the state of California. We'll ship them to you if we can't bring them to your door. We'll mail you door hangers so you can tell your neighbors about it and campaign buttons and little sticky notes that'll remind you when to vote. Mark your calendar October 5th is the start of voting. Every registered voter in California will receive a ballot in the mail. So you can vote starting October 5th. Yes, on 43. This is one of the most important taxpayer protections in the history of California.

2:01Probably the most important since Prop 13 itself. And we're not fooling around with this. We are campaigning as hard as we can. And this Friday, if you're in Southern California, come and join us at Pineapple Hill, Saloon and Grill. Pineapple Hill, Saloon and Grill in beautiful Sherman Oaks will be out back on the patio. And the John Phillips show will be live broadcasting from the patio. Will all be there? I'll be there and so will HJTA President John Coupal, who joins me right now. Hi, John. How are you? I'm very good. You had me at Saloon and Bar. Great burgers, great club sandwiches, great drinks. Of course, I won't be drinking. I'll be talking and you can't drink and talk. Well, some of us have tried and you're right. It doesn't work real well. It's a great venue, lots of fun. We really encourage people to come out and meet John Phillips myself. And of course, the star of the show, Susan Shelley.

3:02And last time I've only been there once on another event we did. And we had such a good time. Really, if you want to come meet us and learn more about Proposition 43. Because it is so important. The one thing, Susan, we know about Prop 43 is that if people know what it does, they love it. The question is, can we break through all the noise in the election coming up through November? We've got candidates. We've got initiatives. We've got some really crappy initiatives. We have some really good initiatives like 43. We are asking a lot of voters to become educated on everything that is on the ballot this November. But folks, if you want to live in a democracy and not a theocracy or some oppressive regime, you're supposed to be the boss. We're the bosses and government is supposed to work for us. And I know it doesn't feel like that. Almost never feels like that.

4:03But it's true. If we vote, if people exercise their right to vote and to protect their own pocketbooks, we would win all these battles. But right now we have to break through the noise. I am encouraged by some polling I've seen. I think again, on what we call a fully informed ballot. That means if people know what Prop 43 does, they go, oh yeah, that makes sense. We are taxed too much. And then when they further learn that the two thirds vote requirement was already in Proposition 13 was already in Prop 2 18, that the voters passed in 1996. All we're doing as you have said many times before, we are simply restoring that protection that was already there. We're just trying to get the courts want to weaken and weaken and weaken and we have to come back time and time again to continue this ongoing fight against. It used to be just the bureaucrats and the politicians, but now we're having to continue the fight against the California judiciary, which as you said, is very hostile to the interests of taxpayers.

5:13Well, we are here to protect all taxpayers in California, not just homeowners, all taxpayers, because these taxes that are passing with less than a two thirds vote, sometimes they're sales taxes, sometimes they're parcel taxes on real estate, sometimes they're business taxes that jack up the prices you pay, they can be any kind of tax. Instead of getting a two thirds vote, which is required whenever the money is moved to a particular purpose, if the money is earmarked, it needs a two thirds vote. And what the courts have said is it doesn't necessarily if there's a citizen's initiative to raise taxes. If the citizens want to raise their own taxes, the constitution doesn't apply what kind of crazy ruling is that? And the answer is it's been a whole series of rulings all citing each other in this circular game of telephone. And really that's not what the constitution says. Anybody can read it. It says Plains Day article 13 a section for a two thirds vote for all special taxes.

6:13And really this has to be fixed because you are paying billions of dollars a year in extra taxes, especially in Los Angeles. Lots of extra tax money that you are paying both directly as sales taxes and through higher prices. This is absolutely something that has to be fixed. We're just putting back the two thirds vote that's already in the constitution. That's all this does. Yes, son 43. If you come to Pineapple Hill on Friday, you can pick up a yard sign in person or you can go to yes on 43.com and sign up. It would give us your address. We'll deliver a yard sign if we can. We'll ship it if we can't. I have to say these grassroots campaigns are really a lot of fun because when you get out there and you start talking to people and you put a yard sign out, the neighbors come over. It's like, well, what's this? Tell me about this. Why are you? Why are you yes on 43? What does it do? And people get into conversations about how oppressed they are in California by these very high costs and these very high taxes. And it really becomes kind of a nice feeling even though this is a terrible situation.

7:17It's a nice feeling to know that there are all these other people who share your concerns because we're all kind of isolated that way, especially if you're of a conservative bent in California. A lot of people don't want to talk about their politics and you never find out that there's somebody else on the block who agrees with you. Absolutely. And one thing I have found out is that as Californians, we are bombarded with the progressive perspective from our politicians, from bureaucrats. And in the media, there's very few conservative media voices out there. There's a few and they do a great job. But the overwhelming environment that we're subjected to as conservatives is we think we're like the only ones. Well, you'd be amazed. You go out and you talk to people. You don't like high taxes either. Oh, you're complaining about this regulation. Oh, you think the high speed rail project is as dumb as we do.

8:18You know, there are people out there who I call normies. These are the normal individuals out there who just want to live their lives with a minimum level of interference from government. So they can go to work, you know, feed their families, go to their soccer games. You know, sometimes he was in the best thing government can do. It just stay out of the way. And there are a lot of people out there who simply want. They're not against all taxes. They're not against all regulations. But my gosh, things have really gone off the rails here in California. And that's certainly evidenced by the number, the over, over a well over a million people who have moved out of the state of California to other states. California's net domestic out migration is what we call it. And the net migration out of the state is is way above any other state. And Illinois on a per capita basis or Illinois's got a problem. New York's got a problem.

9:22And where are they going? They're going to freedom, loving states, which California is not. But you know, we all know people. I'm sure all our listeners out there know of people, maybe family members who have moved out of the state of California, not only for the taxes and regulations, but simply the cost of living, which here in California, our cost of living is way above average. So, you know, something to keep in mind is we go forward. We are trying very hard. And we are optimistic despite all this noise the California can in fact be turned around. Oh, it absolutely can. All the problems are man made. All the problems are fixable. It's not even that difficult. When you have a situation where you have, I think it was air quality regulators who decided that we have to have different tires. We have to we have to ban the sale of seven was the energy regulators as California energy commission decided that we need fuel efficient tires. And not only do we need fuel efficient tires.

10:22We're not just going to label them or promote them or give discounts or rebates for them. No, no, no, no, we're going to ban everything else. That's the California way. We're going to make a crime out of selling tires. It's craziness. This this story did I I don't think the regulators knew the blowback they would get this is a relatively recent story. And Susan is right. It is the there's been a lot of pushback about this is the California energy commission and they gave the green light to new rules to phase out the sale of replacement tires that don't meet certain states energy efficiency standards. Now you're thinking tires energy win them in. Okay, I get why they might want to regulate. It's not a good idea, but why they might regulate the miles per miles per gallon or whatever, but tires. Well, there is a modest difference in some tires that it they're easier to roll. In other words, it takes less energy to spin them.

11:28The problem is they are more expensive and they wear out faster. So again, this isn't attack right on the middle class of adding substantial costs to your everyday lives in a manner that other states are smart enough not to pursue. And the really strange thing about that tire regulation is that it was enabled by a law that was signed by Gray Davis one week before the recall election that threw him out of office. That's how old this is. It was from 2003. And it was supposed to be implemented according to the text of the law. It was also supposed to be implemented no later than 2008. And yet these apparently are all optional for the legislature. They can do whatever they want and the California Energy Commission can do whatever it wants. And they're going to wind up charging people more for tires and banning everything that all the people in other states are entitled to buy not in California. It's just so unnecessary. But this is this is important to realize and that is the pushback as soon as people found out about this.

12:36People started making a noise and that is what this is all about when you see something that you think is unjust unfair, too expensive, too wasteful. Make a noise about it. Join organizations right a letter to the editor. Let your legislator knows that know that this these tire regulations are stupid and they were never really approved specifically by the legislature. I'm sure what it really was was a grant of some sort of regulatory authority that was probably fairly ambiguous. But really it's important to make a noise about this stuff. I forgot what the other issue was that once people found out about it, there was a human cry that people didn't realize when the law was first passed. And I think the issue was the income based electricity. Usually when people found that it was a national story. So folks, you know, make a noise, you know, get involved.

13:40And you don't have to get involved in every issue. But if you can do your part to get joined one good taxpayer organization such as the Howard Jarrett Stacksberg Association and or your local taxpayer association and also go to some of these meetings is so important. Absolutely, you can check the agendas of your county board of supervisors and your city council. You can read the agenda. See what they're up to. They're usually up to raising your taxes. We have a new number from Cal tax. Our friends at the California Taxpayers Foundation. 181 local tax measures on the November ballot totaling almost $3 billion for voter approval. This is so frustrating because you pay enough and it's never enough. You know, yes, bottom line. It's from from their perspective, it's never enough. But at the state level, of course, you know, I'm going to sound like a broken record. We have the highest income tax rate in America 13.3% highest state sales tax rate in America, highest gas tax.

14:44And even with prop 13, we are well within the top half of all states in per capita property tax collections. That's that's a those are state figures. What Susan just mentioned was the local taxes. Now a lot of these a lot of these taxes are new proposals designed to exploit the Upland Newpol which proposition 43 is designed to stop. Now, unfortunately, if we pass prop 43 and these one of these so called up in taxes pass in the same election. That they would not be covered. It could still be imposed, which is important to make sure that it doesn't even get a simple majority and given this tax climate, I think that's a lot of them are going to fail. But citizens are not without a remedy. There are other provisions of law that were written by the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association that allow you to use the initiative power to repeal or reduce any local fee charge tax assessment.

15:54If you want more information about that, let us know. So let's see how many of these taxes pass. Hopefully not very many. I'm sure many will but let's try to keep the try to keep the taxpayers and the wind column heading into November. This is the Howard Jarvis Radio show from the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association. I'm Susan Shelley here with HJTA President John Coupal. We're at 800-222-5222. If you want to give us a call 800-222-5222. You can be a member of this great and historic organization that's been fighting for taxpayers since 1978. We are so excited to welcome all of you as new members go to hjta.org. Click that button that says join. It's only $15 a year and you strengthen your voice in California. You need somebody speaking for you in the capital when this nonsense is going on and in the various city halls and the county boards of supervisors. You need somebody who is watching out for your interests. HJTA does that. The Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, that is all we do, is watch out for taxpayers. We're here for you.

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27:39We're here for you. We're here for you. We're here for you. We're here for you. We're here for you. We've been in the state of gold. Results and outcomes opposite of what they intended. For example, I think one, one just crazy example for the people in the Bay area. There was a proposed housing tax on the sale of any home, new home, older home in the they were going to use this to finance low income housing. housing. So let me get this right, you're imposing higher taxes on housing to help pay for housing.

28:42I mean sometimes the illogic of these people and of course again getting back to the high-speed rail as an example that was intended as a greenhouse gas remedy when in fact even the legislative analyst said the project is will never offset the amount of greenhouse gases it's producing during the construction phase. So again so many of the policies in California that and some of these people are very well-intentioned I think they're quite a few who are not well-intentioned but even for those who are well-intentioned they do not as our call or just mentioned they do not live in the real world. They do not think things through. So yeah this is this is what we're fighting against almost every day. This is the Howard Jarvis Radio Show from the people fighting for you the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association. I'm Susan Shelley here with HJTA President John

29:46Kupal 800 222 5222. Let's talk to John in Whittier. Hi John thanks for calling. Hello Susan. I'm calling you because I am very upset with this male bill that I received. It's called the Unsecured Property Tax Bill for LA County. I don't know why I have to pay this amount. It's for $1,554 and 15 cents. Well I can't answer that question over the radio because I can't see it and I don't know but I can tell you that if you call the assessor's office County assessor Jeff Prang has a great staff and they will help you figure out what it is and if it's a mistake then they'll help you get it corrected. So give them a call. Yeah do you have a business? No this is this is a home this is a home that I sold two years ago.

30:50Okay it could be yeah it could be a something no I think Susan is right you'd best to take the bill down to the the assessor's office and speak to one of the deputy assessors and they will explain explain to you what it does. If not you can always scan it and send it to us and we could take a look but that's up to you. Yes they have several satellite offices so they probably have one that's close to you or you can go to the website. I think it's assessor.la county.gov and they will help you figure it out and get it corrected if it's wrong. Thank you very much for calling John good luck with that. Let's take a call from Dave in Newport. Hi Dave thanks for calling. Hi I have a question about property taxes as it relates to the wealth tax that's on the on the ballot. Now I try to listen to you all the time but I may have missed if you already talked about this and the real estate tax is just another form of wealth

31:52tax already. That is correct when people say this would really be the first wealth tax we have that's not accurate because in every state the property tax is in fact in the nature of a wealth tax. Now property tax is different than a sales tax or an income tax which is a tax on some sort of economic transaction. The incidence of a property tax is the mere position of one form of asset, one kind of asset that is real estate on a particular day in the calendar year. That's January 1st. So the lean day is January 1st in California but you're right it is a wealth tax but the question is this it's relatively easy particularly under prop 13 to value property particularly the way prop 13 defines value in a very limited way but can you imagine trying to value the your entire

33:01wealth including stocks all sorts of perhaps intellectual property and I think that is one of real weaknesses of this new proposed wealth tax which they say will only hit billionaires but here here's the most important thing to remember about prop 40 and that is it leaves the door open for amendment not by the voters but by the California legislature and the and the rule says that as long as it furthers the purposes of the wealth tax then it can be amended by the California legislature. Now we've seen that kind of language before and we've seen it abused to see how the legislature takes this authority to make things worse and I have no doubt that this so-called one time tax will quickly turn into a two-time tax or three-time tax and if you don't believe me

34:06consider this there is another proposition on the ballot proposition three which is an extension of very high income tax rates and an increase in the sales tax that was adopted I think back in 2012 as proposition three or no 30 it was the promises in 30 back in 2012 and everybody said the title said it's a temporary tax and they use the word temporary like nine times this is just a temporary tax well that temporary tax has already been extended twice and now they're trying to make it permanent so if you think the promises that these people make to you in a ballot argument whether it's temporary or a one-time or all these promises that are associated with either a tax or a bond measure and you don't want to get me started on that all these promises are often as a femoral as

35:12a cloud of dust if they're not worth anything so be very careful about any representations you see in a ballot pamphlet about any tax or bond thank you very much for the call that's proposition 40 is the billionaires tax which can come down and reach everybody else eventually proposition 40 we're recommending a no vote on proposition 40 and there are two other measures that take the teeth out of it in case it passes and that's prop 41 and 42 we're recommending yes on 41 and 42 and of course yes on 43 and that's our website yes on 43.com if you want to get a yard sign if you want to get door hangers if you want to get more information about this important measure if you want to support the campaign because we can't use the Howard Jarvis taxpayers association funding or the foundation funding for a campaign we have to raise money separately for a campaign which means we need donations to pay for more signs and more door hangers and more driving around to

36:14deliver them so hj where's yes on 43.com is the campaign website and if you'd like to get more information about the Howard Jarvis taxpayers association that is at hjta.org and we will very soon have all of our voting guide recommendations for candidates from our pack we have a political action committee that endorses candidates and then hjta does ballot measure recommendations for all the statewide measures and some of the local measures and here in Los Angeles if you're listening on k a bc we have a sales tax increase from the fire department this is one of these so called upland taxes where it's a citizens initiative tax increase and it's going to go through the loophole of not needing a two thirds of vote so the sales tax is already very high in Los Angeles this would push it to 10.75 percent 10.75 percent in the city of Los Angeles which has a pretty high poverty rate a lot of people struggling and don't even ask about the LADWP water and power bills

37:18I mean they could knock you on the floor you really need grab bars next to your mailbox so you don't fall over when you take your DWP bill out of the mailbox it's really bad and now 10.75 percent sales tax that's pretty brutal sales taxes are very regressive and of course it's important to fund the fire department but John wouldn't we see over and over again we see cities and counties spending money on everything else and starving the fire department and demanding a tax increase and that's very frustrating yeah it's they will intentionally shortchange public safety which is what everybody really wants I mean everybody agrees we need fire protection police protection but all the other stuff the travel expenditures all the administrative overhead all the really excessive pensions for your run-of-the-mill bureaucrat they don't talk about that what they do is they

38:19they put on the chopping block as some sort of sacrificial lamb public safety and then they threaten you with criminals in the street or your house burning down if you're not approved the tax folks don't fall for that and and and quite frankly I think people are not falling for that because we have seen this before I think we saw a few years ago in the city of Los Angeles with the unified school district with the with a proposed parcel tax that at the time needed a two-thirds vote and it did not even get a civil majority vote because the school district kept on telling parents that we need this we need this to to do all these things and it was really the parents of school children who were bailed against the tax proposal and their main reason for doing so is because as they told us they lied to us they lied to us all the time about how they're going to spend the money and we see it

39:19and the education for our children never gets any better so people are waking up to the games that these tax razors play you know trying to pull on your heartstrings trying to say that we're in a budget crisis we are not in a budget crisis every year the budget state budget goes way up government spending is higher than it has ever been and the only growth industry in California right now it may be AI it may be a data centers but the other huge growth industry in California is government government is growing very very fast and that is really the the direct result of the extraordinary political power that some of these public sector labor organizations have over the politicians well I have some good news for everybody we have our 2026 voting guide online just now so I can give you the I can give you the address on the internet to get that it's hjta.org

40:24slash 2026 voting guide be sure you put two g's in because I put in one g by mistake and then it didn't work voting guide 2026 voting guide hjta.org 2026 voting guide and if we don't already have a link on the homepage we will by tomorrow so it's already there I just checked it out okay excellent so you can get all of our recommendations you can get the the endorsements from our pack you can read about all the ballot measures we tried to explain as clearly as we could what they all are so that you have more than just one sentence to go on you can kind of figure out where you stand on all these things you may agree with us or not agree with of course you should agree with us but if you don't that's fine but we try to explain them really thoroughly so that you can read more about them and and understand what they are eventually you'll get your booklet from the secretary of state that will have the arguments for and against that will have the legislative analysts summary of of what it does and what it costs and a ballot title and summary from the attorney general which

41:25will essentially tell you that everything is good for taxpayers is terrible so you don't necessarily have to pay attention to that but there will be there will be neutral language somewhere in there that you can see and all the arguments and it's really important to know what these are because you know you're listening to the show you're interested in politics everybody's going to call you and say I know you follow this what should I do I just got my ballot what should I do I don't know what to do what should I do and you can direct them to the Howard Jarvis taxpayers association website at hjta.org and then they can get the recommendations and read all about it and it's really helpful because we have to be informed in California we get these ballots it looks like a law school exam it's very difficult and it's difficult for everybody not just difficult for for people who don't follow it it's difficult for people who do follow it and sometimes there's even litigation about what these things say because people don't agree on whether it's an accurate representation or not hjta.org we've got the information we're here for you we're the Howard Jarvis taxpayers association

42:26and we're fighting for you in the courts in the legislature on the ballot and right here at KSFO in K EBC 800 222 5222 let's talk to Joseph and L.A. hi Joseph hi the government loves banning things because it requires zero budget they just say you can't have this and you know what these tires are you know forcing people to get very very expensive tires or they've got this all electric agenda they're trying to run and if you look at a couple years ago and like arrowhead when they got snowed in for a week or two and they couldn't get in or out and they had no cell coverage imagine being in one of those houses if they were all electric and you could not heat you could not run a fireplace you could not cook I mean and you couldn't go sit in the car and warm up because you have an electric car with with these politicians so realize is having a diverse supply of energy and the diverse use of energy is critical we're also it's also a national security risk because we're

43:30border state along Mexico and along the Pacific Ocean we need diverse supply of energy and we need to be energy independent it's critical and they need to quit with all these bands and restrictions I completely agree with you thank you very much for the call you know we have these climate targets which everyone always describes as aggressive and the other states don't do this and why do we do it it makes everything more expensive here and it really doesn't affect the climate at all they're called aggressive I call them stupid yeah a lot you know most of the European nations are now significantly rolling back their green energy requirements and I am not opposed to solar I have a solar panel on my house I have a solar panel on my RV I'm a big believer in all forms of energy but as the college has noted having natural gas or propane is extremely efficient

44:30and it's just part of the policy of all the above there is some other good news out there and I I think it has to do with the knee jerk negative reaction against nuclear power is beginning to fade and people are now beginning to understand that yes maybe nuclear power particularly the small modular reactors may be a good answer to our energy problems not only with infrastructure but also in order to power some of the data centers that are being built up there so they're well we may sound like we're we're declineists or pessimists but we're not for every problem that California creates there's going to be a solution and I think the challenge for everyone out there is do you really want to be part of the solution well you can help us out by joining the Howard Jarvis Tax Burns Association we're always looking for rational sane solutions to the

45:35state's problems you know we were the organization that did a report on the bullet train in 2008 when it was on the ballot and warned everybody isn't that right John yeah yes in fact I saw somebody posted something about well the only people who don't like high speed rail or the people who never have to go to LA from Northern California well I'm coming to LA on Friday and I know I know that if I were going to take high speed rail even even under the best circumstances even if they completed it it would still take three to four hours when Southwest Airlines can get me down there in an hour again it's just the problem with high speed rail it was ready fire aim they did not try to nobody did the due diligence as to whether or not it was feasible we paid for we sponsored a study that included some of the study authors were pro rail guys a former vice president of Amtrak was part of that study and they concluded rightfully so that in California not necessarily

46:43Europe or China or Japan but in California high speed rail was not viable and so now we're stuck with it even the plan itself the business plan from the high speed rail authority doesn't go to Los Angeles you get to Bakersfield and then you get on a bus you get on the high speed rail bus that's the business plan that's intentional that's not a that's not a fallback position that's the business plan that's how this rail supposedly goes from San Francisco to Los Angeles you take conventional rail from the Bay Area to Merced you take the high speed rail sure you will to Bakersfield and then you take a bus from Bakersfield to Los Angeles which is three hours by itself this is craziness for billions and billions of dollars a bus you could go to Greyhound.com right now I think it's fifty five dollars you can go from Bakersfield to Los Angeles tomorrow or you could wait 30 years and pay a hundred billion dollars and do it yeah yeah the the politicians are

47:49beginning to have buyers remorse on that even some of the communities like through the central valley and Fresno and Bakersfield they are now turning against it because again all these promises about when it would be built how much it would cost was it really environmentally sensitive it is not and what are what are the what is the total cost and right now it's being kept on life support with only and I put only in scare quotes of a billion dollars a year they're giving a billion dollars a year just as just to stay alive and and and yet what they really need is about eighty billion dollars to even complete the next step so well we are we are fighting for taxpayers so you don't get hosed for this kind of stuff anymore so you already are this is the Howard Jarvis Radio show I'm Susan Shelley for HJTA president John Coupal thank you for being with us don't forget to go to yeson43.com and get a yard sign we'll see you next week take care everyone