When I enter the voting booth on Election Day, two groups of Californians will be at the forefront of my mind. First, I will be thinking of the millions of college students in our state, along with those children who hope to one day obtain a college education. My concern will also be for businesses — from large companies like The Gap and Disney to local restaurants, dry cleaners and repair shops in our communities — that employ Californians and contribute to our state’s economy.
For both groups, there is a tremendous amount at stake this November — nothing short of the California dream is at risk. And it is clear that only voters, not legislators, now have the power to preserve that dream by supporting Propositions 30 and 39.
Together, these two citizen initiatives will accomplish what I and many other dedicated legislators fought so hard to put in place in Sacramento this year. We worked tirelessly on behalf of California’s middle-class families, their children and their jobs by working to pass a package of bills that we called the Middle Class Scholarship Act.
These bills addressed a fundamental issue of tax fairness for California businesses. The primary piece of law would have closed a discriminatory loophole in state law that currently benefits corporations only if they are headquartered in other states and employ people elsewhere. It’s a loophole that disadvantages California-based businesses and threatens jobs here while rewarding companies. It does so by letting them choose a lower tax rate based solely on their sales in our state, rather than a rate that considers whether they actually conduct business here or employ people here.
Deep-pocketed corporations blocked our efforts in the legislature. However, voters cannot be bought and sold by out-of-state corporations and their political money, so that means we have a chance to stand up to these special interests by passing Proposition 39.
Proposition 39 will close this loophole so that businesses headquartered in California can compete fairly. It should be easy to agree that California’s tax code ought to reward companies that hire Californians. Every other large state in the country, from Texas to New Jersey, has passed a similar law.
What’s more, changing this law recaptures over $1 billion a year in revenue for our state. With the Middle Class Scholarship Act, we proposed to invest that money directly into making college more affordable. We aimed to cut student fees by 66 percent at UC and CSU schools and reduce community college costs — once again making college affordable for students from middle-class families.
Together, Propositions 30 and 39 will provide the stability in our state budget to do just that. Proposition 39 will put as much as $500 million into the state’s general fund annually, and after five years, that amount will double. Proposition 30 is the last line of defense protecting education funding in California. It will bring in enough revenue to prevent trigger cuts built into the state budget that threaten to slash $6 billion from public schools. It will raise money largely by asking wealthy California families to contribute a little more in income taxes. They will be temporary taxes and only affect families that earn over $500,000 a year.
During our fight to pass the Middle Class Scholarship Act, I was proud to stand alongside so many students from around the state whose inspiring outpouring of support led to phone calls, emails, visits to legislators’ offices, and testimony during legislative hearings. Their hard work pushed our bills nearly to the finish line.
Gov. Jerry Brown has made clear that he will work to pass and sign the Middle Class Class Scholarship next year. That means those of us who believe in opportunity for California students and California businesses must continue the fight by passing Propositions 30 and 39.
We’ve now seen that special interests and out-of-state corporations will stop at nothing in Sacramento to preserve the tax loopholes that favor them. By doing so, they put the California dream at risk for so many middle-class families. That is why it is now up to voters to approve these measures. Only through the ballot box do we have the ability to make California businesses competitive, create jobs and thereby provide current and future generations of students the affordable opportunity of a world-class college education.
John A. Pérez is the speaker of the California State Assembly.
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**** the state
Is Prop. 30 even needed? After all, Prop. 98 ensured that schools would always have all the money they needed.
Great observation! Prop. 98 guarantees a certain amount of money will go to K-12 schools. This left many public employee unions feeling unloved. Prop. 30 will direct revenue to K-12 schools and community colleges, but at the same time politicians can redirect money that WOULD have gone to schools to pay off those public employee unions instead.
Also, Prop 98 was written at a time when a greater percentage of Californians had jobs and were contributing members of society. Now thanks to Obama’s jobless recovery Prop. 98 is not enough to educate our kids and pay off public employee pensions so the Democrats have to devise evil new schemes to pay off the unions while making it seem like schools would benefit.
What’s the purpose of an education when you won’t have a job when you graduate?
You can be one of the hand picked Lib sheeple at an Obama rally.
Gov. moonbeam is trying to make voters an offer they can’t refuse. He knows that Californians value education, so he is traveling up and down the state threatening voters with deep cuts to schools if his Proposition 30 tax hike initiative doesn’t pass. The ugly truth about Proposition 30 that the governor fails to tell voters is that Proposition 30 is a gimmick to backfill the state’s budget and doesn’t guarantee any new funding for schools.
Proposition 30 is just a $50 billion political shell game. Politicians can take existing money for schools and use it for other programs and then replace that money with the revenue raised from Proposition 30′s higher taxes. We never really know where the money is going.
Proposition 30′s inherent flaws have been exposed by state officials and others. The California School Boards Association stated, “The governor’s initiative does not provide new funding for schools.”
Vote NO on 30
Prop 30 actually affects people making over $250K a year, but more important is that the money goes into the general fund, so it really isn’t going to education, and there is nothing in the proposition that allocates any money to the UC. The legislature led by Perez is trying to extort students into voting for the proposition by threatening them with immediate fee increases if the proposition doesn’t pass. After this year ends, they would still kick in the fee increases, because as I said the proposition isn’t meant to give any money to the UC. The only reason we are in this position is because the legislature refuses to use the revenues it already has for the UC. Californians are in the top 10 for per capita tax payments, plus we have huge revenues from the lottery. However, the legislature hates education, so California also has one of the lowest per student expenditures in the nation. Tell Perez to stop pretending to support education, and to put his money where his mouth is by taking all those revenues that are being used on other programs and use them for education.
Prop 30 is a scam that doesn’t add a penny to UC schools. Even UC regent Gavin Newsom, a liberal Democrat, points out that UC tuition hikes are coming regardless of Prop 30′s outcome and in fact are already scheduled. Even if passed Prop 30 will not provide any new funds to the next school year.
http://www.kgoam810.com/Article.asp?id=2554688&spid=18042