When Gutting A Tax Board Is Actually Bad For Taxpayers: New at Reason

Efforts to get rid of the California Board of Equalization are bad news for taxpayers.

Steven Greenhut writes:

When I first learned about the existence of something called the California Board of Equalization (BOE), it sounded like something that might have existed in the novel, “Animal Farm.” All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others. Few things sound more totalitarian than a government agency in charge of equalizing things.

But California’s BOE, founded in 1879, simply is a banal tax board that oversees collection of the state’s sales and excise taxes. It also handles appeals of the state’s income and corporate taxes. The “equalization” has nothing to do with equalizing Californians’ financial status, but making sure “that county property tax assessment practices were equal and uniform throughout the state,” according to the agency’s own description.

Currently, it’s the only state tax bureau in the nation run by elected officials. The board has four elected members who represent large districts, plus the state controller. It has a staff of more than 4,000 people and offices across the state. There have been multiple efforts to eliminate the agency over the years, and in the wake of a series of recent problems, it looks like the agency finally is having its powers drastically reduced.

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