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San Francisco voters approve taxes on highly paid CEOs, big businesses

latimes.com

121–130 of 754 posts

Re: San Francisco voters approve taxes on highly paid CEOs, big businesses

#121
This raises some interesting questions / side effects:

1) Companies may now have a direct incentive to have their lowest income earners be outsourced/contracted out to boost the median pay amount.

2) It was smart of them to include compensation such as stock options. However if a city starts to expect this income, it will all go away in recessions when CEO's stock options are not valuable. ie more money to the city in boom periods and not much in bust cycles.

Re: San Francisco voters approve taxes on highly paid CEOs, big businesses

#122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More likely, this will just result in businesses continuing to leave San Francisco. The pandemic has given most companies a good reason to do so already and my bet is on most of them not returning to their overpriced San Francisco headquarters when this is eventually over.

I have lived in San Francisco since 2005. Over the time I've lived here, we've had the opposite problem: lots of highly paid tech firms moving into SF. This has changed the nature of San Francisco in a way that many dislike, including me. I was initially attracted to San Francisco because, it was chill, it was beautiful, and it had a lot of eccentric, really interesting people. Many of our good friends had to leave o…

If you think white yuppie tech workers are part of the problem, then you are indeed part of the problem.

Re: San Francisco voters approve taxes on highly paid CEOs, big businesses

#123
post #67

With policies like this, why would anyone in their right mind (I say this as a staunch progressive) start a business in SF or even consider traveling to the Bay Area for the benefits of huge equity packages? Even if you choose to willingly ignore that CA state taxes are also increasing substantially. I hate to say it, but when you do things like this to Big Business TM it DOES have trickle down effects that negativel…

> He dismisses fears that the surcharge will drive companies out of the city, saying the tax is modest in comparison to the cost of moving a business.

It doesn't seem like they're too worried about new businesses, they're just trying to hold the current ones hostage.

Re: San Francisco voters approve taxes on highly paid CEOs, big businesses

#124
This raises some interesting questions / side effects:

1) Companies may now have a direct incentive to have their lowest income earners be outsourced/contracted out to boost the median pay amount.

2) It was smart of them to include compensation such as stock options. However if a city starts to expect this income, it will all go away in recessions when CEO's stock options are not valuable. ie more money to the city in boom periods and not much in bust cycles.

Re: San Francisco voters approve taxes on highly paid CEOs, big businesses

#125
Why do these discussions always revolve around the collection of taxes instead of how the taxes will be used? Would anyone be complaining if they knew the taxes would be more beneficial? Conversely, wouldn't we reject these new taxes if we knew they weren't going to be a greater benefit? Does anyone even know how the taxes will be used?

Re: San Francisco voters approve taxes on highly paid CEOs, big businesses

#126
post #99
post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google and Facebook are in the SF Bay Area and not in SF City. Also, Zuckerberg gets a $1 salary. Unless this law targets full compensation (stocks included), it's not going to touch him. FB is too big to accept a 0.1% or 0.6% gross tax. This law is targeting smaller companies (think Stripe and similar). San Jose is an alternative for the CEO/Headquarters. There could be a minor office in the city where tech workers…

The law says any company operating in SF, which would include FB and Google, who have offices there. Also the law says all compensation, including stocks and bonuses. So Zuck would definitely qualify.

The law says any company operating in SF, which would include FB and Google, who have offices there.

Very interesting, but, does that mean that execs who don't personally work in SF are subject to the tax? Ie, will Citibank's Michael Corbat, working out of Citigroup's New York offices, need to pay the tax because Citibank has bank branches in SF?

Re: San Francisco voters approve taxes on highly paid CEOs, big businesses

#128
post #98
post #68

To everyone saying, "this will kill low wage jobs", most companies already outsource their low wage jobs. Their janitors and cooks and maintenance people are already via contractors. Their lowest paid employees are most likely their admin assistants at $50K a year. So basically this is targeting companies whose CEOs make over $50M a year, which is basically Twitter, Pinterest, Google, Facebook, Uber and a few others…

Google and Facebook are in the SF Bay Area and not in SF City. Also, Zuckerberg gets a $1 salary. Unless this law targets full compensation (stocks included), it's not going to touch him. FB is too big to accept a 0.1% or 0.6% gross tax. This law is targeting smaller companies (think Stripe and similar). San Jose is an alternative for the CEO/Headquarters. There could be a minor office in the city where tech workers…

Yes, it includes stock options, property, etc. Basically all compensation.

Source: https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2020/11/san-francis...

Re: San Francisco voters approve taxes on highly paid CEOs, big businesses

#129
Having the pay ratio be relative to the "Median San Francisco worker" might have some interesting effects - for financial/tech firms who want to avoid the tax they might just shift their ~25% lowest paid workers to an office in Oakland (though any corps with a mandatory physical presence like retail won't be able to do this).

Re: San Francisco voters approve taxes on highly paid CEOs, big businesses

#130
post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The law says any company operating in SF, which would include FB and Google, who have offices there. Also the law says all compensation, including stocks and bonuses. So Zuck would definitely qualify.

The law says any company operating in SF, which would include FB and Google, who have offices there. Very interesting, but, does that mean that execs who don't personally work in SF are subject to the tax? Ie, will Citibank's Michael Corbat, working out of Citigroup's New York offices, need to pay the tax because Citibank has bank branches in SF?

I'm not a lawyer or accountant, but my layman's reading of the law says it is a tax on gross receipts for the company in San Francisco, not the CEO directly. But applies if anyone who works for the company makes more than 100x the median.

I'm really not sure how they plan to enforce this at all.

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