You seriously think the US (or local) govt has a good track record with reinvesting tax revenues into low income communities? And be careful with advocating property tax hikes; property taxes can be very regressive for low income home owners.
Are you familiar with the impetus behind Prop 13? (Not the side effects, but the motives.) A lot of homeowners were priced out of their homes because they couldn't afford the property tax rates. Sure they can sell, but then they're stuck as renters.
Prop 13 kicked in in 1978, so 37 years ago. I wonder if there's any way to find out the percentage of homes purchased after 1978. My intuition tells me that most home would have churned by now, since most people who owned prior to 1978 would be in retirement or close to it.
Also, Prop 13 still allows for increased assessments; they're just capped at 2% annually unless the property is sold. Considering the housing boom/bust cycle in CA has been pretty bad, 2% seems equitable.
>Also, Prop 13 still allows for increased assessments; they're just capped at 2% annually unless the property is sold. Considering the housing boom/bust cycle in CA has been pretty bad, 2% seems equitable.
The boom/bust cycle was exacerbated by capping it at 2%.
Property taxes are not raised or lowered, incidentally. They're a flow of income that is redirected from homeowners to the state or back again. Of course, home values increase substantially if homeowners can capture that stream of income derived from the value of the land. Hence the crazzzzzy house prices in California.
