Former gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman is the latest billionaire to cut ties with California as the state grows increasingly malgoverned, unaffordable and hostile to wealth.
Whitman recently sold a 1,500-acre ranch in Fall River Mills, in Northern California, for a cool $17.9 million. She had previously shed other Golden State real estate holdings (including a Sacramento penthouse last year) to live in Colorado.
The former Hewlett-Packard and eBay CEO’s latest liquidation comes as a “billionaire tax” — which would confiscate 5% of any California billionaire’s assets — appears headed for the November ballot.
It also follows years of dereliction from Sacramento.
Gov. Newsom and legislators have ignored or exacerbated a long list of crises, from rampant homelessness, to sky-high housing, gasoline and energy costs, to a fraud epidemic the feds have stepped in to fight.
Meanwhile, the Dems in charge — and their union and nonprofit cronies — have gorged on taxpayer money: This year’s state spending plan of $349 billion is more than double California’s $171 billion budget of 10 years ago.
Whitman is the latest billionaire to decamp for a better-run state.
Her shift follows a long list of others; many fled at the very proposal of a 5% wealth tax advanced by the hungry SEIU-United Healthcare Workers West, which seeks money for its members.
But Whitman’s decision to cut the cord to California carries particular resonance: She was the last GOP candidate to run a competitive race for the governor’s mansion. She brought strong ideas and a pile of her own cash to a contest she lost to Jerry Brown, 53.8% to 40.9%.
The ex-CEO campaigned on common-sense issues such as cutting fraud, restraining state spending and reforming public education — needs which, a quarter-century, later are more acute than ever.
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That was the same year — 2010, at the height of the populist conservative Tea Party craze — that Chuck DeVore, Tom Campell and Carly Fiorina batted in the GOP primary for US Senate before Fiorina went on to challenge, albeit unsuccessfully, then-incumbent Sen. Barbara Boxer.
DeVore and Fiorina, both strong candidates, have also quit California.
The state has spent years chasing talent away.
And not just billionaires. Despite the best weather on the planet (as former Gov. Brown used to remind those who warned of exodus), California has lost some 200,000 people over the past five years, per US Census data.
This means fewer jobs, less brainpower, diminished dynamism — and of course, fewer tax receipts for Sacramento, unions, nonprofits and other stakeholders that drive the state’s cost of living ever-higher to serve their own parochial interests.
Whitman’s exit is another warning.
Before long, there won’t be much “wealth” left to tax. Who’ll be holding the bag then?
California voters should oppose this mess, and urgently. They can start by defeating the “billionaire tax,” and, in November, choosing candidates who represent change and not the failing status quo.
And we don’t mean the lunatic socialists who would make things even worse.
The post Meg Whitman, too? More top talent departs California appeared first on New York Post.
