Propsed California Veterinary Service Tax

[equus_peduus]

Governor Schwartzenegger has proposed a service tax as one way to help balance the CA state budget. This tax would affect things like golf green and amusement park entrance fees, the services rendered by your mechanic or laundry repairman... and your veterinarian. The veterinary profession is the only medical profession to be targeted by this tax - all human professions will be exempt. It is demeaning to the profession to be put on the same level as the vacuum repair guy.

This tax will not only affect those who are trying to get veterinary care for their pets, but agriculture as well. The cost of exams, diagnostics and surgeries is already out of reach of so many pet owners, especially now with people losing their jobs. Agricultural animals, whose owners/managers traditionally get by with the minimum amount of veterinary care possible, will suffer as the cost of any services rendered by the herd vet goes up. Dog and cat food, as well as human meat prices, will likely rise as the cost of raising the cattle and chickens goes up.

Animals who might otherwise have been able to be helped will suffer because the governor wants to put a 7-10% tax on not just the goods sold, but the services rendered by veterinarians. California residents, please help out by voicing your opinion to the governor. All it takes is a telephone and a minute of your time.

- Call the Governor's office at 916-445-2841.
- Select your language choice.
- Press "5" to leave your opinion on a current issue.
- Press "1" to select the issue of extending the sales tax to veterinary services.
- Press "2" to "oppose" the Veterinary Services Tax proposal.

More information is available at the CVMA website

 

[oxchincerelyxo]

thanks for posting this!!!!!!!!!!!!


I just called and it really didn't even take 30 seconds. If people could please get on this!!!!

 

[Snickers]

I already made the call.

What CA government needs to do is get the people with expired car tags. I have seen old ones from 4 years ago. I try to stay away from expired tags because probably 99% they don't have insurance by the way our licenses are going up.

 

[Riven]

Do you have to be a California resident? Does that mean my call really didn't count?!

 

[Rebecca]

Does anyone have a link to the actual proposal text? I'm not particularly fond of educating myself from such a blatantly biased source. I've found letters to be more effective, so I will most likely write one as soon as I've read the proposal and fully understand it.

 

[equus_peduus]

As far as I know, this is thus far only a proposal, and the Governor is the only one who has this proposal on the table. My understanding is that the other proposals for increasing revenue from other people doesn't include this tax. It is not yet a bill or anything as far as I know.

Personally I'm fairly opposed to it regardless (I don't much want to pay a 9% tax on the $600 of work my car needs done...); alternately, I believe that all medical professions (including dentists, optometrists, physicians) should be taxed and not just veterinarians. Not that it's not demeaning to various versions of human doctors to be put on the same level as golf fees too. The CVMA is concentrating on getting veterinary services removed from the proposal rather than getting the whole proposal turfed on the theory that it's easier than just opposing the whole proposal altogether; I can only assume that the car mechanic's association or whatever is probably doing something similar.

There is a bit of information here: http://gov.ca.gov/fact-sheet/10965/ , under "Broadening the Sales and Use Tax to Include Certain Services." I also found almost the same words here: http://www.ebudget.ca.gov/pdf/BudgetSummary/RevenueEstimates.pdf . There's not a ton of information out there; you may be able to find more information than I was; I didn't spend a ton of time looking. Most of the information I've been able to find about it online is newspaper articles from when the proposal was first made in November or so.

Riven: I honestly don't know if they care where you're from to put in a vote. It's a phone survey, so I assume they have a way of keeping track of how many calls came in, and they may keep track of individual numbers to make sure one person isn't skewing the vote too horribly, but given cellphones nowadays, nothing says that a CA resident might not have a MD phone number...

 

[Snickers]

All counties sales tax will go up 1.5%. I live in Los Angeles county so my sales tax will be 9.75%. How can anyone buy small or big ticket items with these percentages?

 

[Lauren_201]

That's pretty ridiculous. I'm making the call now.