[lapcat]

> I am sure Page pays a lot in taxes.

I'm not so sure. That's why I was asking before for evidence.

> Every minute he lives and practically every dollar he spends inside California has a tax burden associated with it.

In what sense is this different from any other California resident?

> He may not pay the same percentage of his overall wealth as others

That's a vast understatement.

> but thats just how this all works.

That's how it has worked. The wealth tax is trying to change it.

> What matters is: Does he pay what he is legally obligated to pay

How is that what matters? Yes, every person should pay what they're legally obligated to pay. I'm not sure how this is even relevant to the discussion, or how it distinguishes Larry Page from any other person.

> It’s about those next 70k jobs that he likely wont create in California, but might create in Texas or Florida.

There's no evidence that Larry Page can or will create another Google now.

It's also worth noting that Page was just a relatively poor college student when he founded Google. It wasn't because of his wealth. Perhaps he'd have more incentive to found another Google if he were deprived of all his wealth again. On the other hand, perhaps he just had one really great idea in his life.

> The fastest way to hobble your state is to drive out the wealth inside it.

It's one dude. Maybe a few more dudes will go too. In any case, California will be fine. The largest state in the nation does not depend on one dude.

Larry Page came to California from Michigan, not for the tax rates, but to attend Stanford. Last time I checked, Stanford still exists, and is still in California.

[kcplate]

Wow…so laser focused on the trees and on the one man aspect of this.

California can certainly choose how to tax it’s residents and businesses and they will own the results of those decisions. Personally I doubt that implementing aggressive wealth taxes will do anything to reverse the population loss trends they are seeing and will help encourage new business investment. Perhaps I will be proven wrong, but I doubt it.

[lapcat]

> Wow…so laser focused on the trees and on the one man aspect of this.

The subject of the HN submission is the California wealth tax, which affects only billionaires. There are only about 200 in California. Moreover, only a few of those billionaires have left California, or are threatening to leave. So, I'm "laser focused" on the subject of the HN submission and puzzled by your remark here. Note that Larry Page's name is literally included in the submission title. I don't know what else I should be talking about here.

> I doubt that implementing aggressive wealth taxes will do anything to reverse the population loss trends they are seeing

That isn't the purpose of the wealth tax. And again, there are only about 200 billionaires in California, so even if they all left, which isn't happening, that's practically nothing compared to the total population of almost 40 million.

I haven't investigated, but my suspicion would be that high housing prices are a significant reason for people leaving California. Creating another Google wouldn't help at all with that. To the contrary, it would probably drive up the housing prices even more. Even big tech company employees find the housing prices ridiculous!