Higher Taxes for the Rich, More Investment Urged by Skinner

Responding to Gov. Jerry Brown's recent State of the State address, the state Assembly representative for El Cerrito, Kensington and Albany, Nancy Skinner, said California can recover its lost "greatness" by investment and higher taxes on the wealthy.

"To achieve the greatness that we had, we not only need to recover from the hit of the recession we also need to reinvest," Skinner says in a 1-minute, 44-second YouTube video response to the speech.

Skinner, a Democrat, is sponsoring a bill, AB1130, that would impose an additional one percent income tax on income above $500,000 a year. Skinner says the increasing concentration of wealth among the super-rich has been accompanied in California by a reduction in their taxes.

"Today California’s wealthiest pay a lower state income tax rate than they did under Governor Reagan," she wrote in a column published by the California Progress Report.

A "Fact Sheet" from her office on the bill says, "Although less than one percent of California taxpayers would be affected by the bill, AB 1130 would contribute an estimated $2.3 billion in additional revenue for the state." (A copy of the Fact Sheet is attached to this article.)

Brown, also a Democrat, is also supporting a temporary increase in taxes on the state's weathly as a way to balance the state budget. He seeks to put that proposal, along with a temporary increase in the state sales tax, on the November ballot to let voters decide.

The chief investment project urged in his State of the State speech was the high-speed rail system. He also supported renewable energy, the Bay Delta Conservation Plan and increased education spending.