Discussion

• @tayfromca Taylor Budowich on x

  Over the last decade, California's spending overall has doubled, while its population has stayed FLAT. The state's education budget has doubled, while the number of students has DECLINED. Bloated budgets on the backs of billionaires. Now they're gone. Think those Democrats

• @chamath Chamath Palihapitiya on x

  Unfortunate update as of today: More calls from friends. The total wealth that has left California is now $1T. We had $2T of billionaire wealth just a few weeks ago. Now, 50% of that wealth has left - taking their income tax revenue, sales tax revenue, real estate tax revenue

• @garrytan Garry Tan on x

  Larry and Sergey can't stay in California since the wealth tax as written would confiscate 50% of their Alphabet shares. Each own ~3% of Alphabet's stock, worth about $120 billion each at today's ~$4 trillion market cap. But because their shares have 10x voting power, the [image]

• r/InterstellarKinetics r on reddit

  BREAKING: Peter Thiel donates $3M to fight California wealth tax 💰🚨

• r/politics r on reddit

  Thiel Gives $3 Million to Group Seeking to Block California Wealth Tax

• @refriedbrean Henry Brean on x

  Billionaires spending millions of dollars to stop from being taxed is a pretty good argument for taxing them, isn't it?

• @austinahlman Austin Ahlman on x

  Preventing two guys who own 6% of the stock from perpetually controlling the board of the most powerful corporation in history is good, actually. [image]

• @joffemd Marc Joffe on x

  Not to be outdone by SEIU California, the Union's San Francisco local has its own city-wide soak the rich tax measure this year. “Overpaid* execs just have to move their companies a few miles down Highway 101 to get away from this one. [image]

• @ptuomov @ptuomov on x

  California would effectively confiscate about 75-80% of Google founders stakes with the wealth tax, property going to the state and federal governments. This tax ballot initiative is so insane that it's nearly guaranteed to pass. https://x.com/...

• @naval @naval on x

  @garrytan It's 5% after-tax so they'd each lose 80% of their stake. If they gave anything to charity or trusts, they're still on the hook. And pour one out for illiquid startup founders, who will go through personal bankruptcy, pay out their liquid savings and be on the hook fore…

• @hanlonbt Brian Hanlon on x

  Yes, the poorly conceived wealth tax proposal is also an example of how undisciplined progressive advocacy harms Democratic electeds.

• @garrytan Garry Tan on x

  The law is so poorly written. While the lawyers who drafted it claim it doesn't apply to publicly traded shares, they designed a legal trap where Class B voting shares would count as private shares and therefore considered ownership. It's so dishonest. [image]

• @loomdoop Y Disassembler on x

  No one is cutting ties with California. These people are doing nothing but a tax fraud / evasion scheme where they change addresses on correspondence. If anything, this shows how taxes are too low, and allowing these people to amass so much wealth has no long term benefit.

• @eytanelbaz Eytan Elbaz on x

  Idea: California offers Larry Page and Sergey Brin $10M cash each to move West to California! We will make it all back on the 13.3% annual income tax. Would be amazing to have these two jon creators as part of the California taxpayer base. Can I get support for this idea?

• @nic_carter Nic Carter on x

  havent been following closely but just figured out what's going on - ballot initiative gets voted on in nov 2026, implemented 2027 if it passes - to avoid people dodging the tax, it gets backdated to CA residency as of jan 1, 2026 - a bunch of billionaires leave dec 31, 2025 -

• @levyantoine Antoine Levy on x

  Just the exile of Brin and Page (worth a combined ~500 billion) implies that the predicted revenue from California's “one-time” 5% wealth tax of ~100 billion is already overstated by 25%. That's not even counting the loss in other taxes (income, property) they used to pay.

• @andyfang Andy Fang on x

  I love California. Born and raised there But stupid wealth tax proposals like this make it irresponsible for me not to plan leaving the state. This Class B thing itself could wipe me out. Being founder-led is a big part of what makes DoorDash special. I will fight to keep it

• @asymmetricinfo Megan McArdle on x

  The problem with a wealth tax is that people move to avoid it. Folks proposing this tax had a clever idea to avoid that: backdate tax to Jan 1st, put it on Nov. ballot. So the billionaires are moving now, and California may lose their tax revenue even if the initiative fails.

• @linkofsunshine Basil on x

  The California proposed wealth tax is awful, just the way it's structured even moreso then being a wealth tax. It effectively makes two-tiered stocks illegal by judging ownership based on voting shares instead of total shares!

• @tbpn @tbpn on x

  a16z's @bhorowitz says the California wealth tax is the “best strategy” to dismantle Silicon Valley that he's ever seen. “It's been so hard to break the Silicon Valley network effect, but this is the best strategy I've seen.” “Norway has an unrealized capital gains tax. [video]

• @yuchenj_uw Yuchen Jin on x

  California's wealth tax is indeed ridiculous. Take Ilya Sutskever as an example. He has $20B+ worth of OpenAI equity now. Let's say he owns 1/3 of SSI, worth $10B+. He has to give California 5% x (20+10) = $1.5B. And he cannot pay with OpenAI/SSI equity. He has to pay in cash!

• @pmddomingos Pedro Domingos on x

  California's wealth tax will instantly vaporize every AI startup worth billions, because the tax due will exceed the money raised.

• @mattyglesias Matthew Yglesias on x

  There are a million problems with the California ballot initiative system but experiencing capital flight due to a poorly proposed wealthy tax proposal that has not been adopted and is opposed by almost all the state's elected officials deserves to be the nail in the coffin.

• @teddyschleifer Teddy Schleifer on x

  NEWS: Sergey Brin, one of the founders of Google, has also been engaged in recent conversations about ways to defeat the billionaires proposal, according to two people briefed on the matter. https://www.nytimes.com/...

• @teddyschleifer Teddy Schleifer on x

  NEWS: Peter Thiel is in for $3 million to a group pushing against the California billionaires tax. Sergey Brin may get very involved too with big donations of his own. The next phase — the politics. With @RMac18 https://www.nytimes.com/...

• @chamath Chamath Palihapitiya on x

  Collectively, the amount of Billionaire wealth that has left California in the last month (!) is now in excess of $700B. That means the $2T of California wealth they expected to tax is now down to $1.3T and falling quickly. I would not be surprised if 2026 ended with less than

• @rmac Ryan Mac on bluesky

  New from us: Peter Thiel gave $3 million to a business lobbying group looking to oppose a proposed California initiative to tax billionaires.  Other billionaires are expected to throw in $$$ as well.  —  www.nytimes.com/2026/01/11/u...

• @scottdagostino.ca Scott Dagostino on bluesky

  Billionaires are spending more money to NOT pay taxes than the taxes they'd pay.  Seems ludicrous but this has never been about money, this is about POWER.  They refuse to be held accountable in any way and the very notion of a public good is alien to them.  We need politicians w…

• @teddyschleifer Teddy Schleifer on x

  Peter Thiel's $3 million donation to a PAC that is opposing the California billionaires tax very notably lists his place of residence as ... Florida. [image]

• @garrytan Garry Tan on x

  Democrats becoming anti-tech anti-prosperity is not a good thing A new focus on abundance, while defunding graft and waste, is the correct path to build a prosperous future Not shutting down datacenters or mass asset forfeiture [image]