Greer Dove’s days are packed with studying business and finance, as well as doing administrative work at college, along with caring for her eight-year-old daughter with special needs. But once a week, Dove, a single mother, makes sure to drop in at the food bank in California’s Marin County to pick up vegetables, fruit and other food. Along with the federal government’s food benefits, they keep her housing running. “We need this so we can keep functioning at a high level,” she says. “She loves fruit, so I make sure to get it,” she says of her daughter.

Dove, who is also looking for a full-time job, has worked in restaurants, event management, retail, television shows, office administration and payroll over the years. But she has been on the federal government’s Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP) for six years, and with the food bank, for more than three years. Before she got food benefits, Dove fed her daughter all she had and skipped meals or looked around for snacks in the offices she worked at to get her through the day.

  • panthera_@lemmy.today
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    3 days ago

    It’s not going to work. Billionaires will simply leave California resulting in less tax revenue.

    • SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca
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      2 days ago

      Then you pass an exit tax law. Norway did this. 38%.

      Media is constantly telling us we need to succumb to blackmail of billionaires leaving.

      • panthera_@lemmy.today
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        2 days ago

        From https://www.forbes.com/sites/nathangoldman/2025/11/14/can-a-5-wealth-tax-on-200-billionaires-save-or-sink-california/

        The most common issue raised by skeptics of wealth taxes is “capital flight”. As discussed in a Tax Notes article, “such a tax would signal to wealthy taxpayers that they should reside elsewhere.” This article goes on to discuss that high-income taxpayers pay the majority of state income taxes in California, and even if a small number of those individuals leave, it could lead to long-term tax collection consequences.

        This concern has been underscored by numerous academic studies. Most recently, an NBER working paper co-authored by Jakobsen, Kleven, Kolsrud, Landais, and Munoz finds that 1 one percentage-point increase in the top wealth tax rate in Sweden and Denmark leads to an outward migration of wealthy taxpayers by two percent. Other work in the American Economic Review by Moretti and Wilson documents that variation in jurisdictional taxes significantly influences the location of talent, suggesting that higher tax burdens lead individuals to relocate.

    • sin_free_for_00_days@sopuli.xyz
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      2 days ago

      You might think so, but that’s not what happens. Also, fuck them if they won’t pay their fair share. Good riddance to the fucking ghouls.

      Such proposals have raised predictable outrage from the rich, along with threats that they’ll move elsewhere where taxes are lower and dire predictions that their fellow plutocrats will refuse to move in.

      Yet there’s scant evidence for these consequences. In fact, when Massachusetts passed a “millionaires tax” in 2023, conservatives claimed the rich would flee. But two years later, they haven’t — and Massachusetts has collected $5.7 billion for infrastructure and public education. -Robert Reich

    • TheTimeKnife@lemmy.worldOP
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      3 days ago

      Some will, but why would California want to keep around useless leeches that take from local services and dont contribute to society at all? California is one of the most desirable locations for the rich to live on the planet. It is propaganda produced by morons that they dont have the power to cash in on that. Believe it or not, but these taxes will make california even more economically competitive as the money is reinvested into infrastructure and human capital instead of yachts. Its insane how badly conservatives have brain washed people into thinking looting public coffers for the rich is the only way to run an economy. Very few fled New York when Mamdani was elected, and almost nobody will do shit about California taxing the rich correctly.

    • zergtoshi@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      Do you think or even have proof that billionaires pay tax?
      They rather spend the money on ways that help them avoid doing so.

        • sin_free_for_00_days@sopuli.xyz
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          2 days ago

          They hide their income so they don’t pay tax. This is a wealth tax. On their wealth. Like the middle class pays with their property tax.

        • SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca
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          2 days ago

          They will tax the wealth, not the income which is legally zero because they borrow money against it.

          • panthera_@lemmy.today
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            2 days ago

            From https://www.forbes.com/sites/nathangoldman/2025/11/14/can-a-5-wealth-tax-on-200-billionaires-save-or-sink-california/

            In addition to concerns surrounding capital flight, there are numerous other concerns with imposing a wealth tax. For starters, it can be very difficult to value a taxpayer’s wealth. Naturally, a stock and securities portfolio maintains accurate valuations on a regular basis. However, real estate assets have much looser valuations, and some assets like artwork require professional assessments. When considering the entire portfolio of assets for California’s billionaires, it remains unclear as to how expensive it might be to value a taxpayer’s wealth accurately, not to mention how long it will be litigated once that taxpayer inevitably argues the valuation. Additionally, enforcing a wealth tax can create liquidity problems for taxpayers as they might have to sell assets to meet the tax liabilities, and it could lead to substantial tax planning that results in the taxpayers gaming the system, and thus, the proposal would not have the intended effect.