Anyone with a smartphone knows the drill.
Your phone lights up with a message: a software update is available promising faster performance, security improvements and fewer bugs. We rarely read the release notes before clicking “Install Tonight” and hoping that it doesn’t break something that was working just fine.
California’s state government increasingly resembles software built on layer after layer of legacy code – making this November’s ballot feel less like an election and more like an operating-system update.
Think of this year’s state ballot propositions as 14 optional software updates.
Each promises to fix a problem, improve the state’s performance, or eliminate that persistent bug that everyone has been complaining about.
The release notes might read something like this:
California OS 2026.0 is now available.
New features installed:
- Increased regulations by several hundred pages
- Added new requirements on how tax dollars can be spent
- Expanded state debt by tens of billions of dollars
- Imposed new ID requirements for voters to participate in system
- Created expensive new government programs
Known issues:
- Housing remains expensive to build or buy
- State government remains too big and unaffordable
- Health care costs for patients and taxpayers are still unacceptably high
Unlike the release notes that we never read on our phones, it’s critically important that voters read every word before voting yes to “Install Tonight” on election night. After all, some critical updates might introduce new policy bugs that will need to be fixed in the future.
Here’s the thing: I’m actually a fan of patches as they are sometimes essential.
The problem isn’t that Californians keep installing patches.
The problem is that the state’s operating system needs them so often.
Like with your phone, there’s three types of critical updates among this year’s ballot measures.
There’s the emergency patches aiming to fix problems that government couldn’t – or wouldn’t – solve. One example is Proposition 45, which would reform the California Environmental Quality Act to remove unnecessary building logjams. Its release notes would read:
Patch 2026.45 is now available for voter approval.
Bug fixes:
- No longer having to take forever to build housing, water projects, and clean-energy infrastructure among scores of critical projects
Patch:
- Streamlining the environmental review process for many types of projects.
Developer notes:
- Environmental review became so effective at preventing development that California is now considering an environmental initiative less environmentally obstructive.
Then there’s the beta feature updates. Think of these as the “let’s try Version 2.0” updates. An example is Proposition 40, which would impose a wealth tax scheme on California’s wealthiest taxpayers. Its release notes might read:
Patch 2026.40 is now available for voter approval.
Patch:
- Taxes billionaires’ unrealized wealth.
Warning:
- This feature has not yet been tested in production.
- May produce an unexpected migration of capital, tax revenue, and residents.
- Use at your own risk.
Then there are patches for earlier patches:
- Patch 2026.02 (Proposition 2) would update California’s rainy day fund – passed in 2014 – so more money could be saved (and less money is available for mandatory tax rebates under the Gann Limit – itself a past bug fix).
- Patch 2026.03 (Proposition 3) would make permanent the existing tax on high-income Californians (enacted in Proposition 55 – itself a past bug fix) that funds education and health care programs, which was set to expire in 2031.
There’s even proposed patch fixes for other patch fixes on the same ballot. Patch 2026.40 (Proposition 41) and Patch 2026.42 (Proposition 42) are bug fixes that – if either receives more yes votes than Proposition 40 – would effectively kill the bug that is the wealth tax outright on the very same ballot.
After election night and the voter-approved updates have been made, Californians might get the following message:
California Update Complete. Restart required.
Unfortunately, nearly every Californian clicks:
Remind Me in Two Years.
While software companies periodically rewrite old code, governments rarely do. Instead they add layer after layer of new laws, regulations, constitutional amendments and bonds. Nothing gets removed – everything is added to the legacy code.
That’s why California’s system of state government becomes slower each year. Not because every new idea is bad, but because the operating system has become too complicated.
But unlike phone users, California voters aren’t just consumers. They’re also programmers.
When the developers in Sacramento – think lawmakers – refuse to fix the bugs or accidentally create new ones, voters still have the power to write their own code.
California’s initiative process is one of the greatest democratic innovations of all time – and it’s a feature worth protecting.
Maybe before we download California OS 2028.0, Sacramento should spend less time adding new features—and more time deleting code nobody needs anymore.
Tim Anaya is the Pacific Research Institute’s vice president of marketing and communications and co-author of The California Left Coast Survivor’s Guide.