No One Term Governor, and Other Notes on the Inaugural
Jerry Brown is not thinking about being a one term governor. Introducing his 98 year old aunt sitting in the audience at his swearing-in ceremony, Brown told the gathering that those who were hankering for his job would have to wait. He has good genes and plans to be around for awhile, he said. Those thinking that Brown might consider stepping down after one term better reconsider.
Brown insisted — twice — that he had no mental reservations in taking the job. Probably a good idea, since anyone who wants to be governor of California probably should have his head examined.
When he reiterated his three principles espoused during the campaign, his pledge to only raise taxes with a vote of the people got the softest applause. My interpretation — most in the audience would rather see tax increases with no vote of the people, just raise the taxes!
Taxes, of course, are the crux of the budget crisis that Brown hopes to solve. Taxes are the glue that holds government together. When government tries to do too much without the necessary revenue government unravels.
5 Head-Scratching Zen Riddles for Jerry Brown
California new governor Jerry Brown famously traveled to Japan in the 1980s to study Zen Buddhism. Asked by a public radio station last year what Zen had taught him, he replied: “Illusions are endless and our job as human beings is to cut them down.”
In that spirit, I offer Brown five head-scratching Zen riddles that we must hope he can answer one day. Zen riddles, or koans, are stories, statements or questions that can’t be understood by rational thinking.
5. The master said: “Zen is a man hanging from a tree over a cliff. He is holding on to a twig with his teeth. His hands hold no branch. His feet find no branch. Up on the cliff-edge a man shouts at him: ‘Why did you run for governor again?’”’
4. If he gives the public employees what they ask for, he is lost. If he says no, he is still lost. What must he do?
3. A state government has been cutting its budget for years. This budget consists mostly of money for local governments. If a new governor gives the local governments control over their money – and then offers them much less money – how long will it take to draft the recall petitions?
2. If a state is ungovernable, does a new governor make a sound?
1. Prop 98.
What California Employment Will Look Like in 2011–With Help from Gladys and the Pips
Based on the job numbers we’ve seen over the past nine months, I would agree with recent projections coming from our California-based economists that unemployment in California will continue to be above 10.5% throughout 2011 (higher throughout most of the year). However, there are four employment dynamics that may impact the pace of recovery, and that we need to keep an eye on.
The UCLA Anderson School in December projected that unemployment will go down slowly in 2011 from the current 12.4% only to 10.9% by the end of 2011. Anderson economists also projected that the state would gain a net of 183,000 jobs. Chapman University economists in December projected that the state would gain a net 167,000 jobs and that the California unemployment rate would remain above 10%.
These projections are consistent with the no-significant-hiring trend we’ve seen in California in 2010. The most recent monthly state job numbers, released on December 17,2010, showed a very modest net 1600 jobs, with a number of the major job sectors (trade, transportation and utilities; financial services; manufacturing) registering net job losses.
California’s Third Brown Era
Cross-posted at NewGeography.
Jerry Brown’s no-frills inauguration yesterday as California governor will make headlines, but the meager celebration also marks the restoration of one of the country’s most illustrious political families. Save the Kennedys of Massachusetts no clan has dominated the political life of a major state in modern times than the Browns of California. A member of this old California Irish clan has been in statewide office for most of the past half century; by the end of Jerry Brown’s new term, his third, the family will have inhabited the California chief executive office for a remarkable two full decades since 1958.