Assembly Speaker John Perez has announced his support for a ballot measure establishing a new “rainy day reserve” for the state budget. Still to be answered: is his proposal more responsible than the measure already on the November, 2014, ballot? In other words, what is the problem with the measure slated for 2014 that the [...]

With two years of dealing with nothing but the broken state budget behind him, for now, Governor Brown at long last has shifted his attention to economic development. Leading a small army of state bureaucrats and business leaders on a long march through China, the Governor has declared his single focus is on economic issues: [...]

Yesterday I presented testimony to the Assembly Committee on Accountability and Administrative Review regarding the implementation of legislative regulatory reforms enacted in 2011. Following are excerpts from that testimony. This morning I would like to spend just a few minutes talking about SB 617 and regulatory reform efforts in a historical context, the advantage of [...]

California taxpayers paid $5 billion more in taxes in January than state officials anticipated. So is this an early sign of a robust economic recovery, or simply taxpayers paying in advance of when the bean-counters expected? I lean toward the latter, since both tax changes and tax uncertainty have been far more apparent than widespread [...]

State-run health insurance exchanges are one of the most important developments from the federal Affordable Care Act (ACA). True to form, California was an early adopter of insurance exchanges, approving legislation in 2010. Called “Covered California,” the exchange is up-and-running with the help of federal grants and state administration support. California has also opted in [...]

It’s almost cliché to declare that California spends more on K-12 education than any other single budget program. Public schools are obviously a top priority for increased state funding and for the attention of state policy makers. But schools aren’t the most richly-funded government function. That distinction goes to Medi-Cal, the state’s healthcare program for [...]