In California, I understand that a new constitutional amendment (expected to pass) is intended to double State tax revenue. According to National Review (hardly an enemy of big government), income taxes would increase for the highest bracket to a tax rate of 18.05%. There would also be a payroll tax – like Medicare and Unemployment, paid by the employer. Of about 2%. AND a “gross receipts” tax of 2.35% on all revenue received by a company – whether they make a profit on not. And that would be basically a sales tax on ALL transactions: wholesale and retail. Again, paid by the seller, supposedly.

Of course, all these taxes ultimately are paid by the consumer and the wage/salary earner. All told, California wants $163 billion dollars a year INCREASE – double current State theft – beginning in 2023. If this insanity passes. And as I hear, it is expected to pass.

Why?

Because lower income voters will not pay any more in income taxes than they already do – Anyone making less that $14,133/year will pay 1% of their taxable income – an astonishing $93.25 per year. (A California food stamp recipient gets $250/month. Sounds cool, eh? You pay Newsom $93.25 and he gives in $250 in food stamps, and other benefits!)

National Review’s writer thanks that the biggest beneficiaries of this insane tax increase will not be the Golden State. (This, by the way, raises Californians’ combined average federal-state income tax to an astonishing 55.05% of their total income (not counting local or sales taxes.) (And the gold plating on everything about California is getting worn away faster and faster. What’s under it? Maybe pot metal – not even honest aluminum!)

Who will win? NR says Nevada and Arizona, followed by all the other States to which impoverished former middle-classes will flee. California lost population in 2021, and they say more will emigrate to other places.

Frankly, I disagree. Californians – well, EX-Californians – mostly make VERY bad neighbors, expecially in large numbers. Why? The may have left California because of insane taxes, insane masking and lockdown and vaccination laws (or even wildfires and mudslides), but California politics doesn’t seem to leave them: they bring the mindset of Big Government, nanny-state ideas, and tax-and-spend with them. To Nevada, to Arizona, to Utah and Colorado and even Wyoming and Idaho.

And they infect people with their ideas: “government should do more and more,” “our taxes provide for free services that government pays for,” and “government is the final solution to everything.” These refugees from the formerly Golden State have been brainwashed and spoiled. With a worse plague than COVID-19 or Spanish flu.

Beware of people escaping from California – show them kindness (they didn’t get much in California as a rule) but assume that they are fanatic statists and sadly contaminated by living in a world of political correctness and parasites. At least until you and others teach them about liberty and freedom. (Assuming they are willing to listen and learn.)

If we do not do this, the many people fleeing California will bring the ideas and wants to OUR states that are destroying California. At the same time, we need to pray and support those who want to break up that state and/or have it exit the Union. Even in another state, the people running the asylum are dangerous to us. Arizona and California are likely to get sucked in as California sinks.