Millionaires for Prop 75

Millionaires for "Paycheck Protection" - Their Own, That Is...

Despite claims by its proponents that Prop. 75 is a “paycheck protection” measure, the millionaires who are funding the initiative have no interest in protecting paychecks, wages, health care or collective bargaining rights. Their agenda is to protect their own business interests and roll back the protections workers have won through unions.

The business elites who fund the Republican Party and lobby against the interests of workers will have their own paychecks protected if union power is weakened by passage of Prop. 75.

With corporations already outspending unions 24 to 1 on election campaigns nationally—without being required to get permission from shareholders—the business class already has an advantage in promoting their agenda. They can count on Gov. Schwarzenegger to veto any bill that would raise the minimum wage or close loopholes allowing offshoring of bank accounts or outsourcing of jobs. They have a special interest in protecting their bottom line. And according to information on the new “Millionaires for Prop 75” web site (http://www.MillionairesforProp75.com), that bottom line is already pretty fat for the overpaid corporate executives who support the measure.

The website set up by the Alliance for a Better California points out that: “Prop. 75 was designed and bankrolled by these corporate and right-wing heavyweights to silence the voices of workers in the political process to make it easier for Governor Schwarzenegger to pass his harmful agenda: cutting school funding, harming health care, and putting public safety at risk.

“First they tried to hide their names by funneling money through a secret committee, now they are trying to hide behind the fake name ‘Teachers, firefighters, and law enforcement’ for Prop. 75.”

Millionaires for Prop 75 lists about a dozen corporate fat cats, noting that there is no evidence that any of them have ever worked as “teachers, firefighters, and law enforcement.” Of course, workers didn’t put Prop. 75 on the ballot and bankroll the campaign. About 97 percent of the money for Prop 75 has come from a small handful of millionaires, billionaires, rightwing ideologues, and corporate special interests.

The list includes many super-rich businessmen with ties to ultra right wing organizations like the Club for Growth, corporate CEOs who donated lavishly to George W. Bush’s campaigns, and conservative activists who handed out millions of dollars for school voucher campaigns and the 1998 paycheck deception measure, Prop. 226.

Among them are Hilton Hotels Corporation CEO Stephen F. Bollenbach, who “earned” over $25 million last year in stock options—approximately 750 times the amount a starting teacher earns; Univision Chairman and CEO A. Jerrold Perenchio, one of the world’s richest people with a net worth of $2.3 billion; Howard Ahmanson, heir to Home Savings and Loan (now Washington Mutual)—an extreme radical, having argued that “the Bible opposes minimum wage laws;” and David Booth, co-chairman of Dimensional Fund Advisors, an investment firm that handles more than $1 million of Gov. Schwarzenegger’s investments.

For the complete list, see http://www.betterca.com.