Californians back raising taxes on state's wealthy Strong bipartisan support for 1% increase, poll shows

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(04-01) 10:30 PDT SACRAMENTO -- With negotiations over how to solve California's $26.6 billion state budget deficit stalled, a new poll released today shows strong bipartisan support for something Sacramento lawmakers this year haven't seriously debated: raising taxes on the wealthiest residents.

Seventy-eight percent of likely California voters support a 1 percent increase in the income tax rate for Californians earning more than $500,000 a year, according to the poll, which was conducted by Democratic pollster Ben Tulchin and sponsored by the California Federation of Teachers.

A one percentage point increase, which would raise an estimated $2.5 billion a year, offers a possible Plan B for helping solve the budget deficit, with 60 percent of Republican respondents and 79 percent of independents and other voters backing it, along with 89 percent of Democrats. The maximum income tax rate is 9.55 percent, according to the Californian Franchise Tax Board.

People are angry

"There is a populist anger out there that cuts across all lines," Tulchin said. Many voters felt it was unfair that the wealthiest Americans got their Bush-era tax cuts extended last year.

"They see that these (state) service cuts would affect middle-class and lower-class people, and they want rich people to pay their fair share," Tulchin said.

Lenny Goldberg, executive director of the California Tax Reform Association, said, "Those are the highest numbers I've ever seen. On a tax scale - that's pretty much a perfect score."

The teachers union is looking to partner with other labor groups to put the tax before voters in November. Such a measure would need approval from a majority of voters.

The measure is seen as a "sweetener" to lure more voters to the polls should there be another measure on the ballot in the fall asking voters to support tax increases to balance the budget. Legislators and the governor have already agreed to $11.2 billion in spending cuts and funding shifts.

Lawmakers haven't seriously considered taxing the wealthiest Californians this year because it takes two-thirds of the Legislature to approve a tax increase. Republicans, who control slightly more than one-third of both chambers, oppose any taxes.

Reaction in Sacramento was guarded.

"Obviously, the people are getting frustrated with the minority party in the Legislature," said Gov. Jerry Brown's spokesman Gil Duran, who declined to take a position. "Eventually, their voices will be heard."

The incomes of the wealthiest 1 percent of Californians grew 81 percent from 1978 to 2008, while those in the bottom 20 percent dropped 11.5 percent, according to the nonpartisan California Budget Project.

California ranks 12th nationally in total state and local taxes and fees, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce.

"Republicans are opposed to increasing taxes, regardless of who is paying them," said Sabrina Lockhart, spokeswoman for Assembly Minority Leader Connie Conway, R-Tulare. "Besides, that wouldn't address the structural problems the state is facing."

Tax group unmoved

The poll didn't move the Howard Jarvis Taxpayer Association, a group that many conservative lawmakers look to for cues. A tax on the wealthiest Californians, said Jarvis Executive Director Kris Vosburgh, could drive them and their cash out of the state.

"There is nothing more mobile than rich people and their capital," Vosburgh said.

But a 2010 study by the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California found that corporate "relocation" of businesses moving from California to another state, or vice versa, "accounts for a smaller share of job gains and losses in California than in most states."

Between 1992 and 2006, the institute found, just 1.7 percent of all job losses were the result of establishments leaving the state.

This story has been corrected since it appeared it print editions.