The Spark

the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist

“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx

California Democrats Fleece the Population

Apr 24, 2017

Democrats, who used their two-thirds “super-majorities” in both houses of the state legislature to pass a bill increasing taxes on fuel and driver registration, pretend that the state has no money for the infrastructure. “Here’s what it costs, and we’re going to pay it,” said Governor Jerry Brown, who pushed for the tax hikes. By “we,” Brown means the working class, whom he is presenting with a bill amounting to 5.2 billion dollars per year, for the next ten years.

This is the same governor who, just a year ago, announced an 8-billion-dollar surplus in the state’s budget. Where’s all that money?

Brown and his fellow Democrats hand the state’s money over to big companies instead, in the form of subsidies, tax cuts and overblown contracts. If anyone doubts whose interests these politicians represent–even in this tax hike bill the Democrats snuck in an extra amendment, allowing trucking companies to use their older and polluting trucks for longer.

The money to fix the infrastructure–and to pay for all the services that are being cut–is there already. But it’s in the coffers of the big companies and banks, where the politicians have been funneling it to.