California Governor Gavin Newsom’s assertion that Texas and Florida are the “real high-tax states” has been challenged by tax expert James Agresti, president of the research organization Just Facts. Newsom claimed at SXSW in Austin that California’s middle class pays less in taxes than those in Texas and Florida, citing California’s progressive tax system. Agresti’s analysis found these claims to be inaccurate based on multiple tax measures.
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Agresti compared average tax collections per capita and as a share of state economies. He reported that California collects approximately $10,000 annually per person in taxes, about double the $5,000 collected in Texas and Florida. When measured against the economies of each state, California taxes about 14% of its economic output, while Texas and Florida both tax roughly 9%. These figures indicate California imposes a significantly higher tax burden overall.
Breaking down specific tax categories, California’s top personal income tax rate stands at 13.3%, whereas Texas and Florida have no state income tax. Property taxes in California, at about 2.8% of personal income, are slightly lower than Texas’s 3.6% and comparable to Florida’s 2.6%. California’s sales tax rate is 7.2%, above Texas’s 6.2% and Florida’s 6.0%. The state also levies a substantially higher gas tax at 70.9 cents per gallon – more than triple Texas’s rate and substantially higher than Florida’s.
Agresti noted that Newsom’s argument appears to rely heavily on data from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP), which he described as “fatally flawed” due to incomplete income and tax accounting. ITEP’s approach emphasizes tax burden distribution across income groups rather than aggregate tax levels, highlighting California’s progressive income tax as beneficial to lower earners while critiquing Texas and Florida’s reliance on regressive taxes. Agresti contends this methodology overlooks California’s overall higher tax pressure on residents, especially top earners and businesses.
A 2025 WalletHub analysis cited by Agresti ranked California as the fourth highest-taxed state overall, behind Vermont, New York, and Hawaii. He also referenced Tax Foundation data supporting California’s higher per capita tax collections. This data contradicts Newsom’s portrayal of Texas and Florida as heavier tax states, indicating California maintains a substantially larger overall tax burden.
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