All those newly-elected Democrats in Colorado had better pay attention to this:
A new poll was released indicating overwhelming support of Colorado’s Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights, which most Coloradans lovingly refer to as TABOR. Fully 71 percent of the 500 Coloradans surveyed expressed support for the policy, and lest you think these numbers are skewed, the breakdown of who was asked is… rather reflective of an actual election in Colorado: 37 percent of respondents were either unaffiliated or members of a third party, 32 percent were Democrats, and 31 percent were Republicans.
Interestingly, the survey found that just under half of respondents supported TABOR and a fourth were unsure when no description of it was provided. When respondents were given a brief objective description of TABOR, virtually all the previously unsure became supporters:
On the initial position on the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights (TABOR), 47% of respondents favor it, 26% oppose it and 26% are unsure.After an explanation of TABOR, 71% of respondents favor it, 28% oppose it and 2% are unsure. The explanation provided was the following.TABOR, the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights is an amendment to the state constitution passed in 1992 which requires state and local government to seek voter approval in order to raise taxes and also limits growth in state spending to population growth plus inflation. If the state collects more revenues than it is allowed to spend, then it must return the surplus to the taxpayers.
The description caused virtually no change in opposition. So maybe the quarter of respondents opposed already all knew exactly what TABOR does. Or maybe their opposition isn’t based on what TABOR does, but on the fact that all the “right people” in government hate it and all the racist, homophobic, misogynistic monsters (e.g., conservatives and Republicans) support it.