New NPI poll finds Washingtonians strongly support a capital gains tax on the wealthy

A clear major­i­ty of Wash­ing­ton vot­ers sup­port tax­ing the cap­i­tal gains of wealthy indi­vid­u­als to help pay for pub­lic schools, col­leges and uni­ver­si­ties, accord­ing to a new sur­vey con­duct­ed by Pub­lic Pol­i­cy Polling for NPI.

Our recent annu­al research poll found 55% of Wash­ing­to­ni­ans like­ly to vote in the Novem­ber 2015 gen­er­al elec­tion sup­port a cap­i­tal gains tax, with just 42% of like­ly vot­ers opposed. Those vot­ers who back a cap­i­tal gains tax are very enthu­si­as­tic about the idea — 43% of respon­dents said they “strong­ly sup­port” it.

As Wash­ing­to­ni­ans are focus­ing their atten­tion on the edu­ca­tion fund­ing cri­sis, this poll makes it crys­tal clear that they want to see a cap­i­tal gains tax on wealthy indi­vid­u­als be adopt­ed as part of the solu­tion to the state Supreme Court’s McCleary deci­sion. NPI’s research shows Gov­er­nor Inslee and the Leg­is­la­ture have a pop­u­lar man­date to adopt a cap­i­tal gains tax on wealthy indi­vid­u­als in order to ensure our chil­dren have the high qual­i­ty edu­ca­tion that is their right under Arti­cle IX of the Wash­ing­ton State Constitution.

As this was a poll of like­ly 2015 vot­ers, we believe it actu­al­ly under­states the true lev­el of sup­port for a cap­i­tal gains tax among next year’s elec­torate, which is pro­ject­ed to be sub­stan­tial­ly larg­er than this year’s.

(Note that statewide turnout in the 2011 gen­er­al elec­tion four years ago was 52.95%; in the 2012 gen­er­al elec­tion, it rose to 81.25%.)

We know from look­ing at past opin­ion research and elec­tion results that Demo­c­ra­t­ic, pro­gres­sive vot­ers are most like­ly to vote in pres­i­den­tial years. And they are the peo­ple who are most sup­port­ive of pro­gres­sive tax reform.

In 2012, Pub­lic Pol­i­cy Polling con­duct­ed repeat­ed sur­veys in the Ever­green State to gauge how Wash­ing­ton vot­ers felt about the pres­i­den­tial race and the guber­na­to­r­i­al race between Jay Inslee and Rob McKenna.

In its Feb­ru­ary 2012 and Novem­ber 2012 sur­veys of like­ly vot­ers, 36% of respon­dents self-iden­ti­fied as Democ­rats. How­ev­er, in NPI’s poll, which sur­veyed like­ly 2015 vot­ers, only 31% of respon­dents iden­ti­fied as Democrats.

The spe­cif­ic lan­guage of NPI’s cap­i­tal gains tax ques­tion was as follows:

Do you strong­ly sup­port, some­what sup­port, some­what oppose or strong­ly oppose tax­ing the cap­i­tal gains of wealthy indi­vid­u­als to help pay for pub­lic schools, col­leges and universities?”

These were the answers:

• Sup­port: 55%
  • 43% “strong­ly sup­port” a cap­i­tal gains tax
  • 12% “some­what sup­port” a cap­i­tal gains tax
• Oppose: 42%
  • 12% “some­what oppose” a cap­i­tal gains tax
  • 30% “strong­ly oppose” a cap­i­tal gains tax
• 2% answered “not sure” 

These respons­es indi­cate that vot­ers have large­ly made up their minds on the ques­tion of whether Wash­ing­ton ought to have a cap­i­tal gains tax.

Vot­ers are clear­ly ready for pro­gres­sive tax reform, even if Tim Eyman and his mil­i­tant Repub­li­can friends in the Leg­is­la­ture aren’t.

The poll was con­duct­ed by Pub­lic Pol­i­cy Polling for NPI from Sep­tem­ber 18th to 21st, 2015, and sur­veyed 613 Wash­ing­ton vot­ers like­ly to cast bal­lots in the Novem­ber 2015 gen­er­al elec­tion. The results have a mar­gin of sam­pling error of +/- 4.0% at the 95% con­fi­dence level.

NPI will release addi­tion­al results from the poll next week.