Amendment 3 – Pass or Fail...What Comes Next? & Inflation Considerations – Top 3 Takeaways – October 16th, 2026
Takeaway #1: Beyond the headlines
Maybe Amendment 3 passes, maybe it won’t. The term tossup is ridiculously overused during the homestretch of any general election cycle – with this year’s cycle not proving to be an exception. For example, you’ll commonly see Florida’s governor’s race listed as a tossup based upon your political prognosticator of choice. I don’t see any meaningful evidence of that being the case. As mentioned in my analysis last week – my inference this entire cycle has been for competitive statewide races to break in mid-to-upper single digits for Republicans – and when adjusting for the historically massive misses for Florida’s pollsters – that's essentially where we appear to be as we’re two and a half weeks away from Election Day. But with that being said, what is truly a tossup to me is Amendment 3. The outcome of the property tax amendment is as much of a tossup election at the statewide level as anything I’ve seen since 2018 – though I am cautiously optimistic that with what appears to be fewer than half of undecided voters needing to break in favor of it – perhaps it ekes across the needed 60% threshold line. Notably, every entity that could possibly attempt to demonize Amendment 3 to keep status quo property taxation in place, has already thrown the kitchen sink at it while doing so and I’ve yet to see a poll, even the least favorable ones, where more than 31% of people say they’re voting no. That we really haven’t seen meaningful movement towards those committed to voting no – is a potential sign that the anti-Amendment 3 contingent is hitting a ceiling with those who they can convince to vote against their own interests. But anyway, the reason this is on my radar as a takeaway today is due to what Byron Donalds just had to say about property taxes. To date Donalds, a supporter of Amendment 3 (as anyone who believes that you, not local governments – should actually own what’s supposed to be your property should be), has said that pass or fail the work on property taxes won’t be done. What he hadn’t been particularly clear on is what he thinks that reform should be (other than providing property tax relief). However, that’s changed this week starting with a speech on Wednesday when he said this: One of the things that’s come up that I’ve been thinking through the last couple of months is right now we have a one-size-fits-all property tax system. But Miami-Dade is different from Marion, and they’re both different from Madison. So I actually think
Takeaway #2: Florida needs a multi-tier property tax system.
While it remains to be seen what specifically that may mean, which also may be influenced by the outcome of Amendment 3, what it doesn’t sound like is what I would propose... a flat property tax plan. As in a plan to phase in the elimination of property taxes. A tired property tax plan would run counter to DeSantis’s vision and what could be a historic opportunity to do the big thing to truly put an end to an unAmerican tax. The key with Amendment 3 on a going forward basis, should it pass, is the open endedness of it. As I covered back in May when Amendment 3 was proposed by the state legislature – this is how the language of Amendment 3 reads: The legislature shall, by general law, prescribe a uniform procedure for counties, municipalities, for their respective levies, to increase the amount of assessed valuation exempt from taxation under paragraph (1), up to all remaining assessed valuation. That language potentially allows a future governor and a future legislature to create the system that could end, at a minimum, homesteaded property taxation within the state of Florida. Governor DeSantis didn’t get a proposed Amendment that ended homesteaded property taxes as he was seeking, however, this is a proposal that holds the potential for the next governor and legislature to do so through legislation as opposed to a constitutional amendment. Or...rework the existing property tax system differently a la what Donalds is hinting at this week - which I would find to be disappointing. That’s a dynamic I’ll be following closely going forward, and that I’ll look to influence should Amendment 3 pass in just over two weeks.
Takeaway #3: How much inflation companies currently eat
I get it. There’s still not likely to be a time when you go to buy just about anything when you think...that’s it? As in the price of what you’re buying is much lower than what you think it should be. And because of the impact of inflation, and affordability concerns and challenges that are real for many, if anything you’re probably thinking that the companies you’re buying stuff from that’s more expensive that what you think it should be are taking advantage of you. But this much I can tell you. They’re not. Obviously, I can’t speak for every single company, but when speaking about buying stuff generally, I can tell you that companies are actually saving you significant money currently. Sound crazy? It’s not. We’ve had back-to-back days of brutal inflation reports – first on consumer prices which showed that the average cost of things rose 3.7% year-over-year most recently. Yesterday’s inflation report – the producer price index, or wholesale inflation report, was much worse. Wholesale inflation rose by a staggering 6.2% year-over-year most recently – which is the highest since we were just coming down from the peak ‘Bidenflation levels in December of 2022. That’s obviously not good! It’s also a potential warning about what future consumer inflation could be if President Trump, his administration, and for that matter the Federal Reserve don’t rather quickly do what they can do to resolve elevating inflation situation. But what the wholesale inflation rate shows – is that companies that sell you things have actually been eating 2.5% of the inflation out there recently. Companies on the whole have been eating some of the inflation out there during the Trump administration right along (mainly through the tariff policies). But as energy inflation has become a ‘sticky’ inflation situation companies having been taking on a lot of that pressure too...meaning that believe or not most retailers have been providing relatively good value to you. However, at some point companies will pass more inflation through if pressures like this persist – so the pressure is becoming greater on the president to find a way to bring energy prices back down by the day...independent of midterm election considerations. Companies are currently eating a considerable amount of the inflation that’s out there, and what’s out there is already too much.