This Is San Francisco’s Plan to Get the 1 Percent to Pay Up

There’s a new target in San Francisco’s income inequality wars: luxury mansions. Jane Kim, a member of the city’s board of supervisors, is seeking to put a proposal before the voters in November that would increase transfer taxes on homes sold for more than $5 million, with properties worth more than $25 million incurring a minimum fee of $750,000 typically paid by the sellers. “There is a strong sense right now in San Francisco that affordability is the No. 1 issue, and the economic divide that we’re seeing here is unprecedented and stark,” says Kim, a civil rights lawyer who’s running for the state legislature. “While we cannot stop people from coming to San Francisco and encouraging this luxury economy, we can ask them to help pay for the crisis that they are contributing to.”

The influx of highly paid technology workers into the city has fueled some of the highest rents and home prices in the U.S., spurring public outcries over tenant evictions and the increase in homelessness. Protesters have frequently targeted the commuter buses that ferry tech workers to jobs in Silicon Valley, about 40 miles south of the city. “San Franciscans are upset that the city has prioritized the wealthy developers and speculators over everyday San Franciscans,” says Sarah Sherburn-Zimmer, executive director of the Housing Rights Committee of San Francisco, which has organized anti-eviction protests.