Surprise, the Budget’s Not Balanced
If the state budget is supposed to be a blueprint, this is
one funny structure California is building.
One month into the new fiscal year and the state is already
10 percent short of what it needs to keep the budget balanced. And as Joel Fox noted
in this space Friday, it’s not like the national economy is inspiring a lot
of optimism that things are going to get better in a hurry.
Sure, July is just one month. And the state Department of
Finance says their numbers are better than state Controller John Chiang’s
report Tuesday of a $538 million shortfall.
Local businesses could fling open the hiring window,
Californians could dig into their wallets and start buying homes, cars and
video games and then cue the confetti, happy days are here again.
Signature Gathering Scare Ads are Right On — Potential Identity Thieves are All Around us, Starting with Political Consultants
I, like virtually every member of the California media and
good government community, was appalled when the group calling itself
Californians Against Identity Theft and Ballot Fraud, backed by the building
trades and pipe trades unions, broadcast a radio ad claiming -without evidence
— that signing an initiative petition put you at great risk for identity
fraud.
But now
that I’ve thought about it – and seen the new, revised ad from the same
mysterious group – I realize I was wrong to condemn this ad. I think the
admakers here are onto something. If anything, the group CAITBF doesn’t go far
enough.
Let’s look
at four messages of the CAITBF ad campaign that should be expanded to protect
all of us against the identity theft-related dangers of political
participation.
Another Nail in the High Speed Rail Coffin
A new study on the California High Speed Rail (HSR) project
released this week says the cost estimates for the first segment of the rail
are much higher than previously calculated. Everyone who is surprised by this
fact please raise your hands. I thought so. The High Speed Rail project has
received one credibility cut after another. Like the tree subject to continuous
hacks from lumberjacks, HSR is about to topple over.
As reported by the AP’s Adam Weintraub, supporters of the
rail are now having second
thoughts. He quoted rail supporter Senator Alan Lowenthal, "We really
need to re-examine what we’re spending and what we’re going to get for
it."
The first leg was tagged at a cost of $7.1 billion in 2009.
The new study reports the cost at anywhere from $10 billion to $13.9 billion,
an increase of anywhere from 40 to 95 percent. And that’s the cost overrun of
just the first leg – a Central Valley leg that doesn’t run through the coastal
metropolises. What will the cost overrun be in trying to build the rail through
those high population corridors?
Travel and Tourism is Keeping California Out of the Red
Travel is big
business for California and leading the recovery post-recession. It is helping
to jumpstart the economy and plays a vital role in our economic health.
How vital?
The industry
provides billions in taxes and nearly a million jobs to the state. While
California’s Real GDP grew at a relatively modest 1.8 percent in 2010, travel
spending (adjusted for inflation) grew at more than twice that rate, up 4.4
percent.
Last year, California tourism generated $95.1 billion in
travel-related spending and $6.1 billion in direct state and local tax
revenues. Travel in California means jobs – employing 873,000 people with
earnings of $29.9 billion.
Simply put: travel matters. It matters with job creation, productivity and
regional economic expansion.
Fed Says Interest Rates will Stay ‘Exceptionally Low’ Through Mid-2013
Tuesday brought news from the Fed that interest rates will
stay near zero until mid-2013, due to "considerably slower" growth than expected. Accepting that growth will not come quickly
now, the Fed also commented: "[t]he committee now expects a somewhat slower
pace of recovery over the coming quarters," and "[t]he unemployment rate will
decline only gradually." The Fed did not
act unanimously, as it usually does, however, and these comments, eagerly read
by the financial community like one would read tea leaves or the entrails of a
chicken, in times past, were the product of a 7-3 vote. The three dissenters are concerned about
inflation rearing its head once again.
We
are running out of the usual tricks which have been employed in past recessions
and depressions to jump start a sick economy like applying those electrical
paddles to a patient whose heart has stopped it’s steady beating. The Fed has decided to keep federal funds at
zero to one quarter percent, which is practically free money for those who
receive money directly from the Fed.