I’m a wealthy Californian. The billionaire tax is a win for everyone | George Zimmer

On Tuesday, California voters will decide whether to enact Proposition 40, a one-time, 5% tax on the net worth of about 250 California billionaires.In recent months, a number of California billionaires and their apologists in the media and in government have come out swinging against the ballot measure. I’m not a billionaire, but I’m a Californian wealthy enough to know that they have no valid reason to fight the proposition. For multimillionaires like me, paying a 5% tax would not change our lives materially, and if we can afford this as people well below the billionaire line, certainly those at the very top can too.Prop 40 would enact the first tax on billionaires anywhere in the world, with organizers estimating it would raise roughly $100bn in revenue, most of which would be directed to healthcare to make up for federal cuts from Trump and Republicans’ 2025 tax bill. Six Nobel Prize-winning economists said it would “kickstart a movement to tax ultra-high-net-worth individuals in other states – and eventually at the federal level and in other countries”.Opponents’ primary objection to Prop 40 is that it will spark an exodus of the state’s billionaires, who would run for the hills of lower-tax states. They further claim this would blow a hole in the state’s tax base and kill the Golden state’s “golden goose”, or its trove of innovative minds.But they’re wrong on all fronts.For one thing, numerous studies have failed to find evidence that wealthy people flee en masse when their taxes are raised, which suggests that Prop 40 critics’ fears of a billionaire exodus are overblown.After Massachusetts and Washington state raised taxes on high earners in 2022, both states actually experienced an increase, not a decrease, in their millionaire populations. A 2023 study also revealed that, despite being a relatively high-tax state, since 2011, California has had the second lowest out-migration rate among households earning more than $200,000.As a person of wealth, I can choose to live wherever I want, no matter the tax rates. Like so many of my rich counterparts, I choose to live in California because I love it here. I don’t intend on leaving anytime soon.I will never be able to get enough of our beaches, our forests, our piers, our cable cars, our universities, and everything else in between. I’m willing to pay higher taxes than I would elsewhere to maintain (and improve) all of these wonderful things that make California the Golden state that it is.To avoid the tax, billionaires would have had to move by 1 January 2026; from what we know, only six of them did. Between 2019 and 2025, California billionaires’ wealth grew an average 15% per year, but they paid just 0.26% of it in state income taxes. They pay so little in taxes as it is that, even if they were all to leave, it would take 25 years under current California law for the loss of their tax payments to exceed the $100bn that Prop 40 would raise.Taxes should be based on the principle that our government should be financed based on one’s ability to pay. When 250 billionaires have the means to pay more, it is their civic duty – just as it is mine – to do so.There is also no reason to believe innovation in California will end if Prop 40 passes. Wealthy entrepreneurs like me are the brains behind a lot of products and services that have enhanced countless lives, and our state has become the place to be for aspiring industry leaders. California’s industries attract top talent and intelligence.A 5% one-time tax will not deter people from pursuing a livelihood in entrepreneurial epicenters. So far in 2026, amidst all the buzz about the ballot measure, no less than 80% of all new venture capital funding found its way to California.In short, Prop 40 will not trigger a billionaire exodus, it will not drain our coffers, and it will not spell the end of Golden state innovation. What it will do is add some progressivity to our state tax code, put a check on the power of the richest among us, and raise significant funds that will prevent hospitals from closing, millions from losing their healthcare coverage, and thousands of healthcare jobs from being cut.I want less inequality because my family and I will be better off in a society with less inequality. That should be a win in every Californian’s book, rich and poor alike. George Zimmer, a member of Patriotic Millionaires, is the chairperson, CEO and founder of Generation Tux, an online rental platform for tuxedos and suits. He is also the founder, former CEO and chair of the Men’s Wearhouse