A proposed 5% wealth tax on California residents worth more than $1 billion is drawing criticism from luxury real estate broker Josh Altman.
“Seven billionaires I know have already left,” Altman recently told Fox Business.
The measure would, if approved by voters, impose a one-time levy on those residents, with payments beginning in 2027 and spread over five years, according to the Legislative Analyst’s Office — a structure that has sparked discussion among business leaders and policymakers nationwide.
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Altman said California has about 200 to 250 billionaires, more than any other state. He also said the state has roughly 40 million residents, including about 23 million eligible voters.
“If this hits the ballot, there is no way that the billionaires come out on top here, and that’s an issue,” he told Fox Business.
His focus was on scale. Billionaires represent a small fraction of the electorate in a state where ballot initiatives can determine tax policy. If the measure reaches voters, the outcome could hinge less on wealth concentration and more on simple arithmetic.
Organizers are seeking roughly 900,000 signatures to place the measure on the November ballot, and the initiative remains in the signature-gathering phase, according to media reports.
Altman said that if it qualifies, the vote would place a handful of ultra-wealthy individuals against millions of voters.
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Altman also shared a remark from a billionaire about the scale of extreme wealth. “You know what the difference is between 100 million and a billion? Nothing,” he said.
He told Fox Business that billionaires would remain financially secure, but the people who rely on them would be the ones affected, adding that current policies are pushing them out of California.
“It’s the trickle-down effect. It’s people, the hundreds of thousands of people that work for these billionaires. It’s the trillion dollars in taxes that we’re going to lose,” he said.
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