charitable organizations—are exempt from the 1.0% property tax rate. In California gasoline is taxed at $0.719/gallon and diesel at $0.749/gallon—these are the highest gas and diesel taxes in the nation. The state legislature switched its gas taxation system in 2010 so it could re-appropriate some of the gas and diesel tax money from road maintenance to other areas of the state budget which was in deficit. Since they re-purposed much of the state and federal fuel taxes there are now complaints that there is not enough money in the transportation funds to do all the required highway upgrades and maintenance. Cigarette excise taxes in California are $2.87/pack. The federal excise tax on cigarettes is an additional $1.01 making the total excise taxes on a package of cigarettes $3.88/pack. Because excise taxes are "hidden" (not listed separately) the price of the cigarettes plus the excise tax have a 7.25% to 10.0% sales tax added to the purchase price—a tax on a tax. California alcoholic beverage taxes varies by beverage, from 20¢ per gallon of wine or beer to $6.60 per gallon of spirits (over 100 proof). The unemployment insurance rate, paid by the employer, is experienced based and averages about 1.0%–6.0% of the first $7,000 of worker's income—employers with high turnovers pay more. The federal unemployment insurance rate (now) is 6.2% of the first $7,000 of a worker's income. The Great Recession resulted in a high unemployment rate, causing California to borrow about $10 billion from the federal government. The Employment Training Tax (ETT) rate for 2014 is 0.1 percent on the first $7,000 per employee per calendar year. The State Disability Insurance (SDI) withholding rate for 2014 is 1.0 percent up to a salary limit of $101,636 income—maximum disability tax for each employee is $1,016.36. Housing The international boom in housing prices has been most pronounced in California, with the median property price in the state rising to about the half-million dollar mark in April 2005. Orange County, Ventura County and the San Francisco Bay Area have the highest median prices, each approaching $650,000. The least expensive region is the Central Valley, with a median price of $290,000. Various real estate markets in California experienced sharp increases in value in the early 2000s, followed by declines in 2007 and 2008, as a housing bubble burst. Beginning in 2007 with the credit crunch in the banking system, thousands of homes have