In Defense of Property Taxes (I Know, I Know)
November 11, 2025
In the 1970s, big increases in house prices in many parts of the US brought big increases in property tax bills, followed by a tax revolt — represented most famously by California’s Proposition 13 in 1978 — with consequences that have reverberated ever since. Even-steeper house-price increases during the Covid-19 pandemic brought a less dramatic rise in property tax revenue nationwide, thanks in part to measures adopted during and after that 1970s tax revolt. But the tax increases were big enough in some places that another revolt has been brewing.
Consequences of the current revolt have so far included inflation-linked floating tax exemptions for owner-occupied homes that were approved last year by Florida and Georgia voters, a 25% property tax cut enacted early this year in Wyoming and a big increase in the homestead tax exemption, with an even bigger increase for the disabled and those 65 and older, that Texas voters backed last week by overwhelming margins (79% to 21% and 78% to 22%, respectively). Activists and politicians in several states have also been promoting the more drastic solution of abolishing some or all property taxes, and although voters rejected one such attempt in North Dakota last year, 2026 is likely to see more of them.
