Bernie Sanders and Gavin Newsom become adversaries over push to tax California billionaires

[GJGCA]

Source: AP News

As national Democrats search for a unifying theme ahead of the fall’s midterm elections, a California proposal to levy a hefty tax on billionaires is turning some of the party’s leading figures into adversaries just when Democrats can least afford division from within.

Bernie Sanders will be in Los Angeles campaigning Wednesday for the tax proposal that has the Silicon Valley in an uproar, with tech titans are threatening to leave the state. Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom is among its outspoken opponents, warning that it could leave government finances in crisis and put the state at a competitive disadvantage nationally.

Sanders is planning a late afternoon rally near downtown, and in the past he has turned out overflow crowds in the heavily Democratic city. The Vermont senator, a democratic socialist, is popular in California — he won the 2020 Democratic presidential primary in the state in a runaway. He’s been railing for decades against what he characterizes as wealthy elites and the growing gap between rich and poor.

“The issues that are really going to be motivating Democrats this year, affordability and the cost of health care and cuts to schools, none of these would be fixed by this proposal. If fact, they would be made worse,” said Brian Brokaw, a longtime Newsom adviser who is leading a political committee opposing the tax.



(On edit, replaced last quoted paragraph, original repeated points found above.)




Link: https://apnews.com/article/california-billionaires-bernie-sanders-gavin-newsom-democrats-87a1e54f463aad49a2093382969e5cca

[newdeal2]

1. This should be fought on the national level

Doing this at a state level makes no sense to me. It will just hurt blue states which already struggle to compete with low tax/ low regulation/ union hating states in the south.

[c-rational]

2. I agree, this shoud be done at the national level; however, I can understand why states like CA

push for it.

[leftstreet]

3. CA billionaires are mostly software, hardware, AI

It's not like their leaving would close down large manufacturers

Not sure how taxing their wealth would break the state

[Initech]

6. Jensen Huang is worth nearly $50 billion.

NVIDIA is based in San Jose. He wants more money. And he's not putting out any new products, NVIDIA is going all in on AI infrastructure. Tax the assholes.

[andym]

9. Hardware + Software makes up a substantial part of CA economy

Google's summary:
"California's technology sector is a cornerstone of its economy, directly accounting for 19% of the state's Gross Regional Product (GRP), which amounted to approximately $623.4 billion in 2022. When including "ripple effects"—such as business-to-business interactions and worker spending—the total economic impact rises to roughly 30%, or nearly $1 trillion"

[leftstreet]

11. Healthcare and retail employ more

along with social services, govt work, etc

I meant the economic impact in terms of employment and infrastructure, should the sad billionaires feel the need to leave

[andym]

12. It may not be the biggest employment group, but 20% of all jobs in a state would be considered a significant loss

especially to those people employed.
"The technology industry in California supports an estimated 4.2 million jobs in total, which accounts for approximately 20% of all jobs in the state. This figure includes both people directly employed by tech companies and the millions of additional workers whose jobs are created through the industry's supply chain and the spending of tech workers. "

[andym]

4. State level billionaire tax is impractical: State level can't work as most billionaires will just leave for red states

their new projects will invariably be created in the red states they move to. Their original blue state will lose future economic development and tax revenue basically. Newsom understands the problem. If Bernie wants such a a tax, it needs to be national.

[Prairie Gates]

5. Do you have any position on this, GJGCA?

[GJGCA]

10. Not sure.

No deep thoughts, just see something of a "what's good for California" weighed against "what's good for electing a D president" tradeoff, assuming Newsom is the candidate, which means it's a wierd kind of what-if game.