Universal Basic Income — Just Another Welfare Program That Will Fail
Earlier this year, a universal basic income bill was introduced in the California Assembly. Should it become law, every resident 18 and over would receive $1,000 a month from the public fisc. Now U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is talking about including a guaranteed minimum income in the next round of coronavirus aid legislation. What […]
Coronavirus State Of Emergency — Under Single-Payer, California Would Be In A Permanent State Of Emergency
For most of us, the coronavirus pandemic is an ordeal we’re slogging our way through. However, some are seizing the opportunity to appeal for support for the health care schemes that have failed other nations. Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, for one, has gone as far as to claim that Medicare for All would have been […]
How State Policy Makers Can Avoid It Becoming Siligone Valley
As unlikely as it seems, we could see in our lifetimes the decline of Silicon Valley, maybe the most dynamic economic and innovation machine man has ever known. Can it be avoided? Facebook cofounder Mark Zuckerberg, who’s earned Silicon Valley’s grandest fortune, said at last month’s 2020 Silicon Slopes Tech Summit in Utah that “I […]
San Francisco Mayor: Hardest Job in America?
London Breed breezed through her re-election at the beginning of the month, taking almost 70% of the vote in San Francisco’s mayoral race. But in winning, she might have also lost. No big-city mayor in the country has a tougher job ahead of them. San Francisco’s troubles start with a hardened homelessness problem, and what […]
California’s AB 5 will kill the gig economy and force more companies to leave
Proposition 13 was called the political equivalent of a sonic boom by economist Art Laffer. In limiting how much local governments could drain from Californians through property taxes, fed-up voters changed the political landscape with the 1978 ballot measure in a way that few state policies have, before or since. Howard Jarvis’ Proposition 13 swept […]
What Journalists and Politicians Are Getting Wrong About Trump Revoking California’s Mileage Waiver
One might think that President Donald Trump said he was going to order the U.S. Air Force to bomb California, given the reaction when he announced that his administration was revoking the state’s waiver allowing it to set its own auto fuel-economy and greenhouse gas emissions standards. The responses included a lot of fighting words. […]
Homelessness, But Not Hopelessness: San Francisco Can Fix Its Problem
President Trump set off quite a tempest when he tweeted that Rep. Elijah Cummings’ Baltimore is a disgusting mess. His next target could be Nancy Pelosi, since he seems perpetually at war with the Baltimore-born House speaker whose city is also being spoiled by urban decay. Sheila Burke said she was driving recently in San […]
Worker Freedom at Risk in California
When the state Supreme Court issued a ruling last year threatening workers’ ability to operate as independent contractors, it sent a chill through the gig economy. The temperature dropped a few more degrees recently when the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals determined the standards outlined by the California court could be applied retroactively. The […]
California Housing Crisis Prolonged By Policymakers’ Inability To Shed Old Impulses
With every idea offered as a serious “solution,” it becomes clearer why California has a housing crisis. The thinking is stuck on policies that aggravate rather than improve. The latest ill-considered proposal picking up support would enact price-gouging laws to keep rental costs in check. Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf, and […]
California’s Doomsday Clock Getting Closer to Midnight
In 1947 a group of scientists unveiled the Doomsday Clock to show how near civilization was to a man-made catastrophic end. Maybe California should have its own doomsday clock, since it seems headed for a wreck. Today’s official Doomsday Clock reads 11:58 pm, two minutes before disaster. The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, which manages the […]