Photo: Getty Images
California lawmakers are coming to grips on how to deal with their large deficit caused by the coronavirus pandemic. They are looking to be out of tens of billions of dollars and may be calling for more taxes against high earners.
Certain unions and advocates for social services are supporting the movement for lawmakers to make this choice.
“All revenue options should be on the table, because we cannot cut our way to safely and equitably reopening schools,” said Jeff Freitas, president of the California Federation of Teachers.
As of now, lawmakers have said they are not interested in considering raising taxes for middle-class Californians.
But this isn't the first time Legislature has said something and done the complete different thing. This is how several new taxes and fees were added to California to help them recover from the end of the Great Recession.
The dynamic echoes how the Legislature approached the last recession, when Democrats advocated for more revenue to save services while Republicans held up budget votes to protest new fees.
“Clearly we have a lot of revenue,” said Jon Coupal of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association — which advocates against tax hikes — noting that California has the country’s highest income, sales and gas taxes. “[But] we’re simply not getting the services that we’re paying for.”
For more information, please read here.