Paul Gunn (left) and Howard Jarvis (AP Photo) raise their hands as their co-authored initiative, Procision 13, takes a commanding lead in the California primary in Los Angeles, June 7, 1978.
The tax and spend lobby loves to blame all of California's woes on Proposition 13. This has become so commonplace that we at the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association have created a “Top 10” list of those blamed for Proposition 13.
Keep in mind that these are not just general complaints like “Proposition 13 prevents unlimited taxation of fixed assets.” We gladly accept that responsibility. But most of the attacks are baseless, and many of them are downright laughable.
One of our favorites is a column written in a small local newspaper by a physical education teacher who cited Proposition 13 as the reason the track team's shot putters keep losing heavy iron balls. The young players couldn't seem to get their shots back on the tall grass, and because of Proposition 13, they didn't have the money to keep the grass mowed.
And some columnists blamed Proposition 13 for the not-guilty verdict in the O.J. Simpson murder trial. According to the author's logic, Prop. 13 left the city of Los Angeles unable to pay enough to hire good investigators.
Of course, no critique of Prop. 13 would be complete without bringing up the obligatory metaphor of how Prop. 13 “starved” education. This myth persists despite indisputable data showing that per-pupil spending, adjusted for inflation, is now at least 30 percent higher than it was in the years leading up to the passage of Proposition 13 in 1978. They are harder to kill than vampires.
Other social ills attributed to Proposition 13: increased obesity rates and decreased number of choral singers. seriously. We're not making this up.
Mental health and related homelessness issues are currently a “crisis” in California, so it’s no surprise that Prop. 13 is also blamed for it.
In an otherwise objective Calmatters article by Jocelyn Wiener, she argues that: [led] to austerity,” and that Proposition 13 “reduced the amount of money available to counties for a variety of services, including mental health.”
But cuts to mental health services are more a result of a failure to prioritize critical programs. Moreover, according to Jesse Unruh, the state itself held a “sneaky surplus” that immediately backfilled local government coffers. Finally, with the passage of Proposition 13, any suspicions of “austerity” quickly disappeared as explosive economic growth generated billions of dollars in new tax revenue.
Today's journalists like to talk about “context,” so let's put into perspective the implications that Proposition 13 of 1978 has something to do with the mental health crisis of 2024. First, California currently ranks 18th out of 50 states in per capita property tax collections, making it hardly clear that California is a low property tax state. In addition to this, we have some of the most burdensome tax rates in the country, including the highest income tax rate, the highest state sales tax rate, and the highest gasoline tax.
Not only is a lack of income not the cause of a mental health crisis, it's clear that, just like with homelessness, the more money you spend, the worse the problem becomes. Perhaps the real problem lies in the counterproductive way in which California's political leadership seeks to “solve” these two related disasters.
In the meantime, collectivists in the tax and spend lobbies and think tanks will continue to blame Proposition 13 for all the problems that exist in the state, and indeed for the things they simply have. We are confident that the blame will be on the. I haven't thought about it yet. Given enough time, they will blame Proposition 13 for the extinction of the dinosaurs. There's probably a connection somewhere.
John Coupal is president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association.
