Proposition D, sometimes referred to as the Overpaid CEO Tax will be on the June ballot. If passed, Proposition D would tax some companies where the chief executives earn more than 100 times the median salary of their San Francisco employees. The tax is limited to companies with more than 1000 employees and with more than $1 billion in yearly revenue.

The Overpaid CEO Tax was created to raise money as the city faces a devastating two-year $650 million deficit, one that can be blamed on President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill which slashed funding for local services. According to the city Controller, Prop D will bring in between $250 and $300 million a year into the city’s general fund, money that can be used to pay for mental health programs, public hospitals and emergency response services.

The measure has earned the support of a mainstream Democrat like Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi as well as progressive stalwarts such as Senator Bernie Sanders. Locally, it has the backing of Supervisors across the political spectrum including District 9’s Jackie Fielder, the Board’s most left-leaning member, to conservatives like District 5’s Bilal Mahmood and District 3’s Danny Sauter.

Among those who staunchly oppose Prop D are Mayor Daniel Lurie and his allies including the Astroturf Network group who has become increasingly close to him, GrowSF. The San Francisco Chamber of Commerce, which is organizing the opposition to Prop D, has raised $3.2 million to defeat it, $2 million in the last month alone. To further confuse matters, the Chamber has sponsored Proposition C, a counter measure that broadens the definition of what constitutes a small business, exempting them from city taxes, while accelerating a tax increase for larger companies. If both pass, the measure with more votes wins. Lurie has also opposed Prop C.

Billionaires Michael Moritz, the tech investor who once bankrolled now-defunct TogetherSF, and Chris Larsen, chairman of crypto currency firm Ripple Labs, have been the largest donors to the effort to defeat Prop D. Moritz has spent $625,000 to fight Prop D while Larsen has poured in $700,000. Other major contributors are PG&E and DoorDash founder Tony Xu.

Lurie and his fellow billionaires argue that even a modest increase in taxes — Prop D proposes raising the taxes on gross receipts by between 0.75% and 1.121%, or on payroll by 0.75% and 4.47% — will cause companies currently doing business in San Francisco  to flee the city.

Moritz has a long history of opposing wealth taxes, whether they are levies on individuals or companies. In 2018, he Proposition C, which raised taxes on large corporations to fund drug treatment, mental health care, shelter beds and housing. He voiced his disapproval of Prop C in the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal. 

Moritz also fought state Proposition 82, which called for taxing incomes of more than $400,000 to fund universal preschool across California. In 2022, he opposed state Proposition 30, which proposed taxing incomes of more than $2 million to fund electric vehicles and wildfire prevention.

More than 61% of San Francisco voters in favor of Prop C. The exodus Moritz predicted never occurred. 

Mayor Lurie had a chance to attack the city’s gaping deficit by supporting a measure that would levy a modest tax on the companies that have enjoyed the privilege of doing business in San Francisco. Instead, he has taken a sledgehammer to the city’s budget, destroying a social safety net depended upon by San Francisco’s most vulnerable residents and consistently defended the avarice of his richest friends and supporters. Lurie has once again sided with the wealthy over those who need help the most.