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

latimes.com

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

#341

Post by wbl »

rbranson wrote: post #301
macspoofing wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>we've had the opposite problem: lots of highly paid tech firms moving into SF. Quite the problem ... the kind of problem that multitudes of cities and regions in the world are desperately trying to recreate. >This has changed the nature of San Francisco in a way that many dislike, including me. This is where progressives don't live up to their name. The nature of cities is constant change. Meanwhile the activists ar…

> The fact that you're white and a tech worker isn't the problem. It's that you had the opportunity to move to San Fransciso for work due to the tech boom, and now you're trying to pull the ladder up so others cannot do the same. This is quite the ad hominem. I may have missed it, but I'm not sure where OP said anything about density or housing. Is there something wrong with not wanting the city that you love to be i…

Ah yes, men and women who look at human needs and decide to serve them in exchange for compensation on the basis of voluntary exchange are just like insects that being multitudes into destitution and misery.

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

#342

Post by cody3222 »

xg15 wrote: post #215
cody3222 wrote: post #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 i…

1) Lowest-income jobs that can easily be outsourced are very likely already outsourced. If the company has the option to do this, why should it hold off doing so?

Like janitors, yes. However you can still go a level up, perhaps to support people. And then another level up, like to entry level sales people.

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

#343

Post by ag56 »

czbond wrote: post #256
kinkrtyavimoodh wrote: post #188

It will work out well fiscally because giant companies will suck it up and pay, but it looks like a bad strategy from a forward-looking point of view. You want to incentivize future growth too, and you want to make sure that 20 years down the line, you have the new FAANGs of the world giving you millions in tax dollars, because history has shown that the largest of companies can eventually die out, and tech is full o…

People will attempt to prove the counter with theoretical, I have an actual to support your claim. Years ago, Denver placed a tax on companies that create software. By "magic", companies decided to found outside the county lines including Boulder. Boulder has an active software scene. Denver is getting there, but still not the advanced companies Boulder has. I believe Denver recalled the tax, but unsure.

Also consider the inverse example of Twitter: SF offered tax breaks to companies setting up on mid market street, and low and behold startups moved in and gentrified the area.

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

#344

Post by offtop5 »

bambax wrote: post #175
offtop5 wrote: post #165

Feels like a great way to encourage companies to leave the state. I left California many years ago. Every single part of my life is much better. Fiscally , romantically, mentally. SF over values how essential location is. With Covid it's clear remote work is the future, base the company out of Delaware and go full remote

This is the eternal objection to measures like this. But if every city and every state implement this, where will they go? And even if not, will they actually move? Will companies move? Time will tell but it seems very doubtful.

Base the company out of a conservative State. The employees can work wherever.

The other issue is how much complying with this regulation is going to cost. California is already very very anti business after all

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

#345

Post by [deleted] »

whoisburbansky wrote: post #35
zadkey wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed, this is problematic if the executive is compensated primarily in stock options.

Why do you think it is problematic? According to my reading of OP, the measures includes stock options in calculating comp.

[deleted]

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

#346

Post by gnicholas »

This appears to just target salaries, not SBC. [1] Considering how large a role SBC plays in executive comp, it seems like this law will not be as impactful as if it looked at total comp. Am I reading this incorrectly?

I would note that it would be difficult to assess the FMV of different SBC for the purposes of these calculations. For example, engineers might get RSUs, and the CEO might get options with a particular strike price, or different amounts of RSUs based on hitting revenue/profitability targets. It wouldn't be simple to value each of these things a priori, and companies wouldn't just accept whatever value the SF govt employees come up if it means huge amounts of additional tax.

1: https://ballotpedia.org/San_Francisco,_California,_Propositi...

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

#347

Post by whoisburbansky »

room500 wrote: post #225
whoisburbansky wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you think it is problematic? According to my reading of OP, the measures includes stock options in calculating comp.

I tried to look up the actual bill, but it doesn't provide any information on how stock options are valued [0] I am curious how you would determine what the fair value of a stock option is when it is granted. Assume the option's strike price is for the current stock price. Theoretically, that stock option has a current value of "0" (assuming that it is non-transferrable so we don't have to worry about market price) T…

I have no idea how far fetched this is, but there are clearly ways to price options given current share price, the stock price, expiry, etc. Black-Scholes comes to mind, but I am not an expert at this and don't know how reasonable of a valuation you could get this way. Just pointing out that there exists a mathematical framework for option valuation, which is presumably what Wall Street uses as the basis for pricing call/puts on the open market.

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

#348

Post by TuringNYC »

kinkrtyavimoodh wrote: post #188

It will work out well fiscally because giant companies will suck it up and pay, but it looks like a bad strategy from a forward-looking point of view. You want to incentivize future growth too, and you want to make sure that 20 years down the line, you have the new FAANGs of the world giving you millions in tax dollars, because history has shown that the largest of companies can eventually die out, and tech is full o…

>> It will work out well fiscally because giant companies will suck it up and pay

I think that if companies do suck it up and pay, it will be declared an effective law and then...the there will be proposals to expand it. It might dip down to also include SVPs, then VPs, and so on

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

#349

Post by jameslk »

cody3222 wrote: post #331
jameslk wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes exactly, it's like everyone is arguing past each other with different assumptions about how taxes will be used. Take this quote from the article: > “We need the wealth that has been generated in the city to be shared more broadly with workers and residents” This person seems to assume the taxes will be shared with the workers and residents. Would they still support these taxes if that were not the case? Others (i…

I absolutely love the historic example of taxes that Benjamin Franklin talks about in his biography: he says he went to all his neighbors' houses and asked if they wanted to chip in a nickel a week and have one of the neighborhood boys sweep the street for everyone's benefit every week. Most said yes and paid the fee. This is literally what tax is in the most simplistic form (let's pool our money to get something we…

Wow what a great example. I hadn't heard this story before but I will be certainly be referencing it. Thank you.

Article I found about it: https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Franklin/01-07-02-01...

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

#350

Post by rbranson »

fuzxi wrote: post #317
rbranson wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The fact that you're white and a tech worker isn't the problem. It's that you had the opportunity to move to San Fransciso for work due to the tech boom, and now you're trying to pull the ladder up so others cannot do the same. This is quite the ad hominem. I may have missed it, but I'm not sure where OP said anything about density or housing. Is there something wrong with not wanting the city that you love to be i…

>Is there something wrong with not wanting the city that you love to be invaded by the human version of a swarm of locusts? He is, by his own admission, one of those locusts.

As it turns out, not everyone who works in tech in SF is an opportunist. There are plenty of kind folks who just want to make a life for their family, but like any boom, it also attracts a multitude of people who are just here for the money and don't give a damn about the city or region.
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