Re: Prop. 13 [was: question on constitutional changes]

[Jim Devine <jdevine03@xxxxxxxxx>]

David B. Shemano  wrote:
> The notion that Prop 13 was a "right-wing" revolt is preposterous.  <

the phrase "right-wing" was not meant as a rigorous scientific or
semi-scientific concept. It's the kind of thing that's appropriate to
cocktail-party conversation (which is what pen-l is, essentially,
perhaps without the alcohol). There are at least two dimensions to the
political spectrum (the libertarians say that there are two and I say
there are likely more). Here, it meant favoring the _status quo_ in
the political-economic set-up (especially, the distribution of
property).

(As I cited on pen-l a few years ago, some social scientists actually
tried to empirically pin down "right wing vs. left wing" by looking at
how different congresscritters voted and how their votes clustered
with each other. It turned out that there were two clear and stable
dimensions: class and issues of racial equality between blacks and
whites. I would add issues such as gay, lesbian, etc. rights and
abortion rights.)

> My father, a dyed-in-the-wool Roosevelt democrat, was an adamant
supporter of Prop 13.
<

I was referring to the _objective impact_ of Prop. 13 more than to the
subjective intentions of its backers. I'd bet that your father did not
anticipate that Prop. 13 and similar measures (due to the entire "tax
revolt" movement) would lead to fall of the quality of California
public schools from being some of the best in the country to being
some of the worst.

(BTW, I wonder if the folks who now try to profit off of for-profit
schools invested in the tax revolt movement? it would be standard
rent-seeking behavior that economists predict.)

> Because of inflation and other factors in the 1970s, California real
estate prices began significantly escalating, and property taxes were
being assessed based upon the appreciated, but unrealized, valuations.
This was a lethal combination for the lower-middle class and
retirees, whose income did not match the home value appreciation.<

didn't I say that? (see the end of this missive.) BTW, I thought my
presentation showed a lot of sympathy for the members of the popular
base for installing Prop. 13, even though it was bad for the state
(IMHO).

> There was definitely a class conflict in my neighborhood over Prop 13
-- the homeowners and retirees on one side, and government workers,
such as teachers, on the other side, but it could not be fairly
characterized as "right wing/left wing."  <

it was more of an _intra_class conflict, because government workers
and teachers are just as much members of the working class as are most
homeowners (the bottom half of them) and retirees.

> Remember, Prop 13 passed with over two-thirds of the vote, a truly
amazing level of support.<

just because something gets majority support doesn't mean that it's
right, or left. I never denied the popular support for Prop. 13, BTW.

> The other major cause of Prop 13, which Leftists usually ignore, is
that the California Supreme Court had ruled a few years earlier that
it was a violation of equal protection for school districts to be
funded by local property taxes.  Therefore, the property tax
collections were effectively centralized in Sacramento and then
redistributed.  As the increased property tax collections did not stay
in the local communities, there was no incentive for property owners
to support higher property taxes.<

yeah. (I wonder why the Serrano decision was never enforced.) In
addition, self-centered retirees and single yuppies didn't want to
support the education of kids who weren't their relatives. To some
extent, there was a racial angle: white suburbanites didn't want to
support the urban schools (via Sacramento) because the urbanites were
seen as part of the "other," the great unwashed. There's probably more
reasons on top of those.

I didn't get into all the reasons because my emphasis was on trying to
indicate that the manipulation by Big Media was not the whole story,
perhaps not part of the story at all.

what I said:
> >> the power structure can definitely affect the results via the media,
> >> but the example of Prop. 13 (1978) suggests that populist anti-media
> >> efforts can be disastrous. After all, the Big Media did not like Prop.
> >> 13, while Howard Jarvis and his followers did not like the Big Media.
> >>
> >> I think that the problems were more structural: I read this "tax
> >> revolt" as a right-wing revolt in response to the failures of
> >> capitalism.
> >>
> >> Back in the 1970s, the big problem for most people was stagflation
> >> (which I see as caused by the fall in the profit rate after the
> >> 1960s). Incomes were falling behind inflation for a lot of people.
> >> More specifically, inflation was encouraging the prices of houses to
> >> rise steeply, which meant a larger property _tax obligation_. (The
> >> state government could have been a bit more moderate here.) The fall
> >> of incomes relative to tax obligation for home-owners meant that a lot
> >> were threatened with the possibility of having to sell their homes,
> >> just to avoid taxes that they couldn't afford. Others simply found
> >> that they were being squeezed by taxes. All of this encouraged the
> >> revolt of the largely white, largely suburban, middle-class
> >> home-owners. Demagogues such as Howard Jarvis joined the revolt and
> >> turned it into a bigger movement, which imposed some other silly
> >> initiatives on the state government.


--
Jim Devine /  "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your
own way and let people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante.