The idea of getting rid of property taxes is generational warfare.

@dancingtongue
That's not because of Prop 13.

That's occuring all over the country.

You may have seen my posts about the need to raise the minimum wage and upward adjust the "poverty" level definition so that more people will qualify for government benefits.

It's INCOME that pays for living expenses, including housing (and property taxes).

And I don't think you realize that in bashing Prop 13 you are undermining your own argument to make housing affordable.

Because if California does away with Prop 13, the guardrails are off and property taxes will rise.

And property taxes ARE part of those living expenses that you say you wish to lower.

@beckyromero
Ah, the either/or binary choice of our digital generation. Never argued that some form of property tax reform was and is necessary. Just abolishing Prop 13 would certainly raise the property taxes for me and others who have had the luxury of it for decades, but at the other end of the scale they would diminish for the new, first time house buyer. They consistently say it is not just the high housing prices, saving enough for the high down payment, and the high interest rates that are keeping them out of the housing market and in the grip of corporate apartment complex owners, but the fact that if they could scrape enough together to buy they then face paying huge property taxes because new owners got no tax relief--their property is being assessed at full current market rates while their neighbors are at some fraction of that. I paid $23,500 for my first house in 1969. My property tax is still capped at the assessed value on that property in 1978, plus 2%/year since then. I sold that house for $800,000 in 2003 and bought my current one for $310,000. It is now worth somewhere in the $1.5M range, but I am still paying property tax based on 1978 (with modest adjustments reflecting renovations I have made plus 2% a year) because we downsized as empty-nesters. A mere fraction of what the guy across the street is paying for the house he bought this year as a first-time buyer. There needs to be a more fitting middle ground, addressing the real tax relief that many seniors on minimal fixed incomes need but not seniors like myself who are fortunate to have more than Social Security nor corporate real estate holders.


Those government benefits that are so rapidly being pared back or totally axed by the current administration?

@dancingtongue
How so? If you abolish Prop 13 and go back to re-assessing properties each year, how will that change anything for newer homeowners?

In fact, they will get stuck paying just as much (or more) as they do now but without the 2% annual limit for increases.

All you would do is keep property taxes high (or make them higher) for newer homeowners - and raise everyone else's, too!

Why? Because there isn't a snowball's chance in hell that California will lower 1% base rate based on the property value that will be assessed.

The super-majority Democratic legislature you have out there will go hog wild! They'll be like kids in a candy store!

Of course, voters would have to pass such legislation via a state Constitutional amendment - a very unlikely scenario.

@BlueVeins

There is also the issue of whether property used for profit should be taxed at the same rate as property used for dwelling purposes.

@beckyromero Frankly, I think it should be the same rate. I think applying a lower rate to residential properties incentivizes the inefficient use of land for housing, such as McMansions and whatnot.

I kinda think the question presupposes this view of property taxes as being just another line item in the balance sheet of people and corpos, when it really should be a tool for factoring in value in the economy which was previously left out of calculations -- essentially, capturing an externality.

@BlueVeins
I wonder what it would cost to go to Disneyland if that property was reassessed at current values? 😯

Maybe those out there who have been to the park can tell us the current prices? (I've been out there on vacation but that was over two decades ago)

@BlueVeins
Sales taxes and government fees are very regressive.

@BlueVeins I know, the lower classes are always squawking about how unfair regressive taxes like sales taxes are, and they even have the nerve to want to increase income taxes on higher wage earners, not to mention taxing capital gains and dividend income.

So, here's a genius idea. Instead of arguing about how fair or unfair a particular tax is, we can use tariffs.

We tell them tariffs are 1) not a tax; and 2) even if they are a tax, they're a tax paid by foreigners and not domestic businesses or consumers.

Obviously, that's not really true, but the lower classes are pretty dumb, and we can make them and small businesses tighten their belts, and pick and choose what worthy industries and even foreign companies get exemptions in exchange for bribes and political favors

/S 😈

@MistyCee

Sort of like Mexico paying for that wall. 😉

@Miram I always thought we should just tax based on unimproved land value. You get some of the same benefits but you get the benefit of not having to litigate whether a property is being adequately used on a case-by-case basis.