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Let them eat cake: layer after layer of taxes in California

Higher taxes, Californians are told, will improve education, reduce traffic, and even fight climate change.

Instead, we face more and more taxes, like an insanely tall layer cake on some crazed reality-TV cooking show.

Start at the bottom, with the state’s wildly high income tax. 

The top tax rate is 12.3% on income and capital gains, plus a 1% “millionaire tax” surcharge, and a payroll tax with no wage cap. Together, those can push the top rate to 14.4%. 

The 9.3% bracket starts at a taxable income of $72,724, and even Californians with taxable income below $11,080 owe 1% of it in state income tax.

Next, there is a layer of property taxes. These were only partially restrained by Proposition 13, which voters passed in 1978 to slow the rate of increase. 

Renters and consumers pay property taxes, too, as owners pass the cost through in the form of higher rents and prices.

Want to get out? The sale of a property may trigger a real estate transfer tax — up to 5.5% in LA, for properties worth more than $5.3 million, thanks to Measure ULA, a 2022 ballot initiative. 

(A new referendum to repeal or restrict local transfer taxes is headed for the November statewide ballot, thanks to the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, which defends Prop 13.)

The next layer of tax burdens comes in the form of sales tax hikes at the local level. They’re soaring above 10% and beyond 11% in some cities, despite a taxpayer protection in state law that caps total local sales taxes at 2% above the state’s 7.25% rate.

Cities and counties get around the cap by asking the state legislature to pass special laws giving........

© New York Post