Billionaires Spend 0.07% of Their Wealth to Avoid a 5% Tax

THE CRITICS SAY BILLIONAIRES WON'T PAY. WE PAID. $293 MILLION, ALREADY, TO AD SELLERS, WHO ARE WORKERS TOO.

We are Endlessen Horrorwitz, and we write for the thirty California billionaires and spouses who put up that money to defeat Proposition 40, a one-time 5% tax on their fortunes. It is about 0.07% of what those donors are worth. The tax would raise at least $107 billion. Anyone can do the sums. We would call it a rounding error, but rounding errors do not buy three ballot measures.

We are job creators. The jobs are in ad sales, polling and the actor at the kitchen table who looks worried about 5%. A job is a job, and the state has never created one for a billionaire's pollster.

“We spent 0.07% to save 5%. That is a seventy-fold return, and the state calls it influence. We call it the only public program that has ever paid us back.”