Editorial: California billionaires flee to Nevada

The Editorial Board, Las Vegas Review-Journal on Jan 21, 2026

Published in Op Eds

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Envy produces terrible public policy.

The Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West, a major California union, is currently pushing a wealth tax initiative. Unlike an income or sales tax, a wealth tax would confiscate 5 percent of the net worth of California’s billionaires, whether they’ve actually realized the value of assets or not.

The union claims this will address the state’s budget difficulties, but it ignores why California is short on cash. Gov. Gavin Newsom and the Legislature have a spending addiction and have made dubious choices, such as giving taxpayer-funded health care to those in the country illegally.

It also ignores one other obvious problem with wealth taxes: Rich people are highly mobile. This has led several countries to roll back or eliminate such taxes in recent years. “While 12 countries had net wealth taxes in 1990, there were only four OECD countries that still levied recurrent taxes on individuals’ net wealth in 2017,” an Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development report noted in 2018. One reason is that “net wealth taxes have frequently failed to meet their redistributive goals.”

Union bosses thought they had found a way around this dilemma. Assuming it qualifies for the ballot, the measure wouldn’t be in front of voters until November. But if it passes, it would affect billionaires who were California residents as of Jan. 1, 2026.

But that didn’t solve the flight problem. It simply sped it up. Many California billionaires decided not to wait around. They’ve already fled the state.

Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page both graduated from Stanford University. They spent decades working and growing fabulously wealthy in California. But each moved assets out of California before the end of last year. Brin moved or shut down more than a dozen California companies connected to his finances and business interests. Seven of them “were converted into Nevada entities,” The New York Times reported. Page did something similar with more than 45 companies he controls. An entity the two men jointly manage also moved to Nevada.

They weren’t the only ones.

“More calls from friends. The total wealth that has left California is now $1 (trillion),” venture capitalist Chamath Palihapitiya wrote on X recently. “We had $2 (trillion) of billionaire wealth just a few weeks ago. Now, 50% of that wealth has left — taking their income tax revenue, sales tax revenue, real estate tax revenue and all their staffs (and their salaries and income taxes) with them.”

Perhaps the SEIU-UHW should next push a ballot measure to repeal the law of unintended consequences.

Regardless, California billionaires remain welcome in Nevada. Just don’t support politicians pushing the same policies that drove you out of your former state.

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