Editorial: Oakland Measure T would hike taxes on almost all businesses

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Backers of Measure T in Oakland tout it as a progressive business tax. If only they had stopped there.

Progressive taxation, in which those firms with larger receipts pay a tax at a higher rate, makes sense, especially in a city such as Oakland that strives to balance inequities and support small businesses.

But Measure T is not a revenue-neutral redistribution of the business tax burden. It’s a 21% increase in business tax revenues, from about $103 million a year under the current flat-rate system to about $124 million under the new proposal.

Voters should reject Measure T.

Large businesses will uniformly see their tax burdens increase, as much as nearly five-fold. As the city struggles to attract businesses and fill the office space it has, making the city costlier to medium and large businesses is a risky strategy. Meanwhile, there’s no tax reduction for the smallest of businesses in 10 of 14 categories.

This isn’t just a progressive redistribution of the tax burden, it’s an increase for almost all businesses — with the extra money going into the general fund in a city with revenues that already far exceed similarly sized communities.