Charlotte Samuels
Political Science
10/24/12
Proposition 30 Every year, the tuition for colleges rises significantly. Our education budget keeps getting cut by the millions. And we as students are struggling to make ends meet just trying to finish up our college education. We need to find a solution to this calamity. With Proposition 30, we might be able to make our first steps down the yellow brick road. Currently, our student tuition fee is $46 a unit. On July 28, 2009, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed AB2X (the education trailer bill to the 2009-10 state budget), setting the community college enrollment fee to $26 per unit(1). In 2011, it rose to $36 and our budget got reduced by $290 million(2). Who knows what will happen next year if this bill doesn't get passed. Let's start with the bad news first. The most important thing on the average citizen's mind is the fact that California's state tax will rise to 7.5% from 7.25%, a 3.45% percentage increase from the current rate(3). That's not too bad considering a couple years back our sales tax was at an even higher premium at 8.25%. It also raises taxes for people in tax brackets of $250,000 and higher. Which is something to consider, but as a student, I feel that the wealthier population needs to help us in order to bring back the economy and make this a prosperous nation again. As logic dictates: the more education an individual receives, the better job they can acquire, the more money they make, which equals the more money that can contribute to our economy. The question is, what is the end result of all these tax rises? Well how does $6 billion dollars sound! 78 billion pesos! 3.7 billion British Pounds! 480 billion Japanese Yen! That sound's like a terrific number. Alas, the downside is that community college system would not receive all that money. Though we would receive a cool $210 million for our efforts. That may not sound much, but that can be counted for an additional