Tax Commission To Seek Extension
The Commission on the 21st Century Economy, set up to give recommendations to the governor and legislature on reforming California’s tax structure, was due to issue its report on April 15th. At the Commission meeting held at UC Berkeley today, Commission Chairman Gerald Parsky recommended that in light of the special election on May 19 which will deal with budget and tax issues, the commission should seek an extension for its report until sometime during the summer. The commission members unanimously agreed. Parksky noted that new commission meetings will be added to the schedule if the commission’s life is extended. Only one more meeting was scheduled to be held April 9 at UC Davis. The Commission will need a revised executive order from the governor to change the due date of its report. More on the commission hearing at Fox and Hounds later.
Business Bruised at Ballot Box
You hear people say it all the time: Los Angeles is a business-friendly town.
C’mon, now. Isn’t that a teensy bit hard to believe? I mean, I’d believe Frank McCourt will invite Scott Boras to a weekend fishing trip before I’d accept the notion that Los Angeles loves businesses.
I’ve railed in the past about how local and state governments here routinely rough up businesses. And now it seems a majority of people here aren’t real fond of them, either.
Want evidence? Let’s look at Tuesday’s election.
In the Fifth District City Council race, you have a candidate whom the business community rallied behind in Adeena Bleich. She won the endorsement of the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce and former Mayor Richard Riordan. But she lost the election.
Think Before You Tweet
Unless you live in a cave, you can’t help but hear all the buzz
about Twitter, especially over the last few weeks. Recently, it’s all the media seems to be able to talk about
when it comes to technology. The
political world has been quick to jump on this medium. Even John McCain, who was labeled a Luddite
by some in the 2008 presidential campaign, is getting
into the action.
In times like these, I feel somewhat like SNL’s grumpy
old man. Maybe a bit extreme,
but as a veteran of the dot-com era, I’ve heard this type of hype before. Remember the online grocery retailer Webvan? Well, prior to its catastrophic failure
in 2001, it was going to replace those silly ‘brick and mortar’ grocery stores
once and for all. It turns out
that in spite of the convenience of buying many things online, we all still prefer
to select our produce by hand. But
you wouldn’t have known that if you believed all the media hype back then.
San Diego’s Triple Pension Scandal
The problem of the San Diego city pension deficit is well known. But what is not understood is that many city workers are often entitled to three pensions, not just one.
Even with the new 2nd tier pension structure (a rather tepid improvement that marginally reduces taxpayer pension costs), all current San Diego employees are largely grandfathered under the lucrative plans discussed below.
The problem is deeper than the pension underfunding, or even the burgeoning unfunded liability that now exceeds two billion dollars. The problem is that city workers get a compensation package that’s far more generous than what the taxpayers receive, or what is necessary to hire city workers. It is fundamentally unfair to the employers of the city workers – the beleaguered taxpayers of San Diego.
Below is an example of what pensions a career “general” city employee (not police and firefighters) can receive. Police and firefighters get two pensions (assuming they participate in the DROP pension program), but general employees sometimes can receive three pensions.