How Much Longer Before California Falls Into The Ocean?

How sad for the state that made junior college affordable for me, gave me a home, a church, loved friends and family, along with a stable career and wonderful memories. TD

 Issues & Insights

"But California was never about survival, it was about opportunity, growth, the future. It can be again, but not until the ideologues who have all the political power are thrown out."

"Another billionaire, this time Mark Zuckerberg, has fled the Golden State. There are still plenty left. But the trickle could quickly turn into a flood if voters and lawmakers continue to punish the rich. At what point, one wonders, will it be too late for the state to abandon the path to destruction that it chose to take many years ago?

"Zuckerberg follows Peter Thiel, Sergey Brin and Larry Page as recent ex-pats. He and his wife are reportedly relocating in income-tax-free Florida. The exodus is clearly in response to the probability that voters will approve a special tax on billionaires this fall.

"Most reports indicate the tax will be a one-time levy of 5% on billionaires. But due “to aggressive design choices and possible drafting errors, the actual rate on taxpayers’ net worth could be dramatically higher,” the Tax Foundation says.

"It might also be more lasting than just a single assessment. As we closed out 2025, we warned that “no one should kid themselves about” the tax sunsetting as promised:

California voters approved Proposition 30 in 2012, a ‘temporary tax’ on the state’s high-income earners to underwrite education spending. It was extended in 2016. For now, it will sunset in 2031. But there’s never enough of someone else’s money, so the usual agitators want to make it permanent by placing it on the 2026 ballot in tandem with the Billionaire Tax Act.

"Because there’s never enough of other people’s money, we expect that millionaires will be next in line for the shakedown. This is not some irresponsible claim because California tried just a few years to reach deeper into the wealthy’s pockets with a bill that would have hit couples whose net worths exceeded $50 million with an additional tax. Just because it failed, it doesn’t mean that the junior Castro-ites in Sacramento will abandon the idea.

"It’s rather demoralizing that in our society, billionaires are demonized. When Robert Reich, now a University of California, Berkeley professor who imparted leftist counsel to past presidents, says he wants the U.S. to drive billionaires “to extinction,” and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani says “I don’t think we shouldn’t have billionaires,” they are cheered, not jeered, by the products of public education that is dominated by leftist ideology." . . .