Passage of Proposition 8 may cost California revenue
California voters’ approval Tuesday of Proposition 8, which eliminates the right of same-sex couples to marry, could cost the state and its local governments “several tens of millions of dollars” in lost revenue over the next few years, according to an analysis by the Washington-based National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL). However, NCSL does not expect the proposition to have a long-term financial impact on state and local governments.
Proposition 8 amends the state’s constitution in response to a California Supreme Court ruling overturning a prior law, Proposition 22, that restricted marriage to unions between a man and a woman. The amendment, which was approved by 52.5 percent of California voters, was needed because the court declared that the state constitution protected gay marriage.
The overturning of Proposition 22 could have led to an increase in same-sex weddings in the state over the next few years, which could have led to an increase in sales tax revenues, according to NCSL’s “StateVote08” analysis. StateVote08, available at www.ncsl.org/statevote08/, offers similar analysis of state ballot measures across the country.
Similar propositions were approved in Arizona and Florida, which defined marriage as the legal union of a man and a woman, but NCSL did not provide an explanation of their impact on those states.