California has long had a tenuous grasp of what the rest of us regard as consensus reality. But two new pieces of legislation suggest they’ve gone off the deep end into full Victimhood Identity Politics land:
First, they decided that police shootings wouldn’t be subject to the grand jury process, because what’s a little things like two centuries of due process and the fifth amendment to the Constitution when there are policemen to be railroaded to satisfy black protesters?
They also decided to purge the words “illegal alien” from state statutes, because what’s mere law when there’s political correctness to be pandered to?
Of course, that’s not all that’s new on the Texas vs. California front:
“California taxpayers paid out big bucks to state workers in 2014. How much? More than the Gross Domestic Product of 100 countries, according to new data published by the State Controller’s office. In 2014, more than 650,000 state employees earned a total of $32 billion in wages and benefits.” It gets better: “Nine hundred sixty-nine state employees earned more than the President of the United States.” Added irony:
The lowest paid average workers represented agencies focused on the environment, women and people with disabilities. According to the state’s 2014 payroll data, the average salary for the 11 state employees at the California Commission on Disability Access was just $15,213 per year, slightly more than the $14,494 average salary paid to the four employees at the Commission on the Status of Women.
There is no California. Only Zuul…
Texas unemployment rate: 4.2%. California unemployment rate: 6.2%. (Hat tip: WILLism’s Twitter feed.)
Los Angeles’ new minimum wage has wrecked hotel employment. Or maybe just non-illegal alien employment… (Hat tip: Moe Lane.)
Why Public Services in California Decline Even As Revenues Rise. “Until California’s leaders address the three elephants – retirement, healthcare and corrections costs — that are crowding out public services and causing unproductive tax and fee increases, citizens will continue to suffer and inequality will continue to grow.” (Hat tip: Pension Tsunami.)
Chuck Devore on what makes Texas friendly to business: less red tape and lower taxes.
Voters to San Jose City Council: We want pension reform! San Jose City Council to voters: Get stuffed! (Hat tip: Pension Tsunami.)
TV’s CHiPS never seemed to be involved in ethics scandals the way the current administration is, including no-bid contracts to European companies. (Bonus: it’s also suitable for Dwight’s Art Acevedo watch.)
California’s “Green Jobs Initiative” spent $297 million to create 1,700 jobs.
More on the same theme, and Tom Steyer wasting $29.6 million of his own money pushing it, from City Journal.
California’s SFX: from billion dollar company to bankruptcy.
Tags: Border Controls, Budget, California, Chuck DeVore, Crime, Democrats, environmentalism, fraud, minimum wage, pension crisis, Political Correctness, San Jose, Social Justice Warriors, Texas, Tom Steyer, unions, waste, Welfare State
This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 25th, 2015 at 9:08 AM and is filed under Border Control, Budget, Crime, Democrats, Social Justice Warriors, Texas, unions, Waste and Fraud, Welfare State. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
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With oil below $40 and likely to stay there for quite awhile, the Texas unemployment rate will soon surpass California.
Then there’s the sharp rise in unemployment in the West Tx oil patch.
http://www.newswest9.com/story/10563431/unemployment-continues-to-rise-in-west-texas
Adding a bunch of hotel maid and waiter jobs – the largest growth areas of Texas employment – won’t help much.
While oil prices will indeed cause some measure of pain, the Texas economy is considerably more diversified than it was during the last oil bust.
Also, your apparent underlying assumption that most jobs created in Texas during the last several years are low-paying ones is false. The Texas economy has created jobs across all income levels.
Former Texas Governor Perry, as well as this post, like to talk about Texas creating a lot of jobs in thee last decade. Isn’t the truth that most of those jobs were stolen from other states by means of lucrative taxpayer subsidies, and that the actual number of new jobs created in Texas is much less than all the bravado would have us believe? From everything I read, a lot of the job growth in Texas has come about at the expense of the other states.
It’s less a case of “stealing” business from other states than other states driving businesses and jobs out with high taxes and red tape, and Texas reaping the benefits.
Just ask the business owners themselves:
“In Chief Executive’s eighth annual survey of CEO opinion of Best and Worst States in which to do business, Texas easily clinched the No. 1 rank, the eighth successive time it has done so. California earns the dubious honor of being ranked dead last for the eighth consecutive year.”
Texas didn’t “steal” jobs from other states, other states drove them out with bad policies. Compared to that, the effects of the Texas Enterprise Fund (of which I am not a fan, but which is hardly unique among states) was trivial.