Whatever glory Cali has— tech, entertainment, farming, weather, natural beauty— is in spite of govt rather than because of it.
It's also why your taxes are so high with nothing to show for them. Turns out austerity is expensive for most people. Canada and Mexico have cheap insulin because their governments are only willing to put up with so much profiteering in medicine. One has to ask why the US government is. Is that because of the far left, too?
Hearing people describe Democrats as far left makes them sound like clowns spouting canned propaganda. It's not conducive to conversation as you know you aren't talking to a rational person who can argue in good faith.
Either that or they hang out on 4chan
Isn't this true of most Americans democrat or otherwise.
Rural communities need broadband internet access and we need to work to reduce the amount and impact of echo chambers on the internet
"Black Lives Matter but not if they have to build housing next to me" is a California meme.
See also Prop 13, a tax revolt, being the crux of a lot of California issues.
While government services can certainly be more efficient and cost disease is rampant, we first have to agree that the government should be providing the service in the first place (which we don't, countrywide)
SF spends more on homelessness than any other municipality, but still has rampant homelessness.
SF’s muni is one of the worst in the country in terms of reliability and speed but we have a muni budget that is equal to London per capita.
Most complaints in California isn’t on its ideology, but rather its incompetence at executing its ideology
It seems to me that California does both more economic redistribution via higher taxes and is more open in terms of accepting a wide variety of foreign immigrants, cultures and religions.
I believe the greatest risk to California’s continued prosperity is the lack of affordable housing (which I would associate partly with Prop 13, but also just general NIMBYism). There have been a lot of efforts in the past few years to move towards higher density but I think we’ll need to wait until the next administration to see if this pro-housing approach is going to stick.
Of course things could be better, and like a previous commenter mentioned, there are missing investments in housing, transportation and more. That is however, because of the continuous specter of the right winning state offices and the "left" party basically being centerist.
It’s not as big as California, but has had substantial growth.
Georgia is similar.
[0] https://fcit.usf.edu/florida/docs/c/census/1970.htm [1] https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/FL
Cognitive dissonance, just like the fact that all of the red states have way higher gun deaths per capita than any blue state yet they'll scream about Chicago without looking at the actual numbers
That's not cognitive dissonance, just different definitions. Red staters focus on total homicides. Age-adjusted homicide rates don't bear any clear pattern with red states versus blue states: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/sosmap/homicide_mortality.... https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/gun-ownersh...
Some of the states with the highest levels of gun ownership, like Oregon, Idaho, Utah, Minnesota, and Maine, have the lowest levels of homicides. Rhode Island has far fewer guns than Maine and New Hampshire, but all three have similar homicide rates.
Lol, and now you edited it out. Case in point.
Ok, so right here is the issue. It's like saying that US has no poverty issue, because some of the richest people live here. You yourself mentioned, that it is important to improve the bottom percentiles. And the bottom percentiles in California are not good. Some of the exceptional schools in CA are private, some of them are public, but most likely located in expensive areas. You gonna have to pay for a good school either directly or via insane home prices. Yes, you can find decent schools in less-crowded-but-not-very-rural areas with more reasonable cost of living, sort of a sweet spot. And the majority of those schools aren't gonna be exceptional, the will be fine, just fine. Not better than any other state. But the lowest percentile in the worst area is still gonna drag the whole chart down. Everyone I know in CA who cares about school for their kids either lives in a pricy area or pays for a private school.
As for Lowell, I think that was a big issue for many, but not amongst the 100+ parents that I’ve spoken to on the issue.
https://wallethub.com/edu/e/states-with-the-best-schools/533...
Ranked 42nd overall, 36th in quality and 51st, ie last in safety.
The US weirdly in general has a lot of high ranking universities, but its elementary and secondary schools are very very uneven, at any level.
OTOH, just a few miles from some of the best public schools in the country you can also find some of the worst. While California is segregated, most Californians nonetheless live in relative close proximity to people living in vastly different circumstances, so disparities are very evident.
Let that sink in.
https://www.usnews.com/education/best-high-schools/georgia/d...
https://www.usnews.com/education/best-high-schools/californi...
That is, what evidence do you have that the success is in spite of government? Is there a comparable government or system that is doing better? Why? Or why not?
Despite adding an additional 1.0% tax to fund mental health, homelessness has only increased in California. Efforts to reduce prop 13 inflated property values are feeble at best. Senior and junior water rights, where senior land holders can extract as much water as they want over juniors, based on an arbitrary date chosen in law, have not been reformed. CalPers is very poorly funded compared to other states.
Don't get me wrong, a lot of California's success is due to government. Banning non-competes and funding a strong system of community colleges and state universities for example. But other states are 'kinda' adopting non-compete bans and the state has cut funding years ago to those institutions, which makes me question the value of my tax dollars when a house built just after WW2 costs over a million dollars, K-12 is below the national average, and the public universities here cost much more than well regarded ones in other states. The state is not dealing with it's problems.
I left a while ago and I feel better for it.
Edit: grammar and a few words.
And, most of the bad things you are bringing up are happening all throughout the US. Just feels too convenient to say that the tech industry is in spite of the government, but the failures are because of it.
You asked for an example of another government doing better. I gave you a recent one by California's government. Japan is perhaps the best one, but many other countries do trains a lot better than California despite all the hype and money they put in it's mediocre result. It was a very open question that your follow up questions are trying to pivot to something else.
> And, most of the bad things you are bringing up are happening all throughout the US.
Please read my post again. Being below average in K-12 among the states, despite the high taxes and land values, is not happening all throughout the US.
> Just feels too convenient to say that the tech industry is in spite of the government, but the failures are because of it.
Please read what I wrote carefully above, I did not agree with that fully. My argument was more of the recent CA govt has not been addressing it's problems and the tech industry's success was due to good decisions in the past (and the weather). The recent CA govt actions has been poor. Calling the recent tech boom in spite of government policies is something I can somewhat agree with.
Think of it as me asking if a tennis player is training well. You want to compare to other tennis players, not cyclists.
You may be able to get some cross learning, of course. But I'm specifically questioning if California's successes are in spite of government. Not if their failures are because of it. These are two questions and it is not clear to me that they would have the same answer.
California also gets a lot wrong that interferes with tech: prop 13 and friends, housing policy, incredible corruption, massive local conservatism
But California is most like America as a microcosm: horrifically corrupt but such a powerhouse that it resembles a leviathan that charges despite the parasites on its back and belly.
Indeed, it is literally “incredible”. What passes for corruption in California wouldn’t even be worth noticing on the older states of the east coast, especially the north east. I’ve lived in both.
I assume you are referring to property taxes, but undoubtedly any “dynastic” family is going to have more tax liability from income than from property value.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/294941/largest-ratio-mil...
And that’s why rich people love living in blue states like California.
That drives real estate values higher, and creates a big tax divide between owners and renters.
ftfy
There is some leftists in the US, i found them. Old hippies or young actives doing a lot of hiking/rock climbing/kayaking and playing music. They mostly don't engage in the two-party politics.
- One of the best ways to match models to reality is to see if they have predictive power, for some time now people have predicted that California is doomed, see, “California doom: Staggering $54 billion deficit looms,” https://apnews.com/article/48a9ce5ad7494d22ec0c42ac46ae9baf , but the surplus that year was a $75 B.
- Since 2006, California has cut the rate maternal mortality and women dying in childbirth by 65%, the national maternal mortality rate has increased by 50% to 70%. The impact this one data point has on people's lives cannot be overstated. More women are dying in the States at a rate 6x that of Nordic states and 3x that of Canada, and it's a trend that's increasing for most of the US. Except California. This data is from 2018, but the graph is simply staggering, https://www.npr.org/news/graphics/2017/05/propublica-mortali... and https://cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/220510134152-hponly20...
- Despite the reduction due to the pandemic, California has the longest lifespan in the US for men. If you are born in California, as a man, you will live to 78.4 years on average as compared to 71.7 years (and falling) in West Virginia, 76 years in Texas, 72.6 years in Kentucky, and 75.7 years in Texas.
On average, you will live 6+ to 3+ years longer than most US States if you're born in California. The same is true for women. Data, https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr70/nvsr70-1-508.pdf
This is roughly the same amount you would get from an intervention such as lifelong/prolonged caloric restriction, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3014770/
- Between 2015 and 2019, California's economy grew at a rate of 22%. For comparison, China was 26%. Germany, 15%. Japan, 16%. In December of 2021, California added 42% of all jobs in the US. Nearly half of all new jobs in the country for that month were created in California. Alone. https://mehabe.com/2021/06/14/among-the-five-largest-economi... | https://www.gov.ca.gov/2022/03/11/californias-economic-recov...
- California has the highest rate of income growth in all of the US. Even when compared to Texas. Here's a comparison of the two states,
Despite a slight decline in population, California's per capita income grew at a significantly greater rate than Texas,
"Between 2000 and 2020, California’s PCI was significantly greater than both Texas and the U.S. as a whole (BEA, 2021). Both disparities grew substantially from 2015 to 2020. For example, while California’s per capita income was 20 percent higher than Texas’ in 2015, this gap surged to 30 percent just 5 years later. And this was not simply a COVID-induced phenomenon, as the rising disparity was apparent in 2019 even before the pandemic."
Between the two states, the government invests substantially more on the public in California, even when adjusting for state revenue,
"A large part of this difference between California and Texas, however, is driven by differences between the two states in GDP per capita, which is 22 percent higher in California ($79,405) than in Texas ($65,077) (BEA, 2020). Even adjusting for this, state and local governments loom much larger in California, with their spending representing 20.3 percent of the state’s GDP versus just 15.4 percent in Texas. By this metric California’s public sector is about one-third larger than in Texas, implying that the greater per capita GDP in California explains almost half of its higher state and local spending."
From the data the study concludes that this spending leads to, "it appears higher government spending in California leads to stronger student performance, better environmental and health outcomes, and safer neighborhoods than in a small government state such as Texas"
Full study, https://siepr.stanford.edu/publications/policy-brief/tale-tw...
- We can contrast California against states like Kansas, where they've implemented low taxes and cut public spending as a part of the "Kansas Experiment", the state has gone almost bankrupt and there has been no subsequent increase in GDP growth. The experiment is widely regarded as a failure. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kansas_experiment
There are areas where California doesn't do well, such as homelessness, but by every conceivably metric, California has exceeded other US states. Surely some of this has to do with governance.
If I was to sum up my position here, it's this. You get what you pay for.
A single doctor at a single hospital developed this theory and then tested it. There is a foundation which is partly funded by the state, but they just promulgate the ideas... it's up to the hospitals to do the mortality review and apply what they've learned there. There's really no fingerprint of recent government efficiency to be found here.
What connection is there between government efficiency and life span of citizens? This is a minefield of variables.
Aren't minimum wages significantly different between California and Texas? Wasn't this phased in around that time? How much of this increase is due to this?
We can contrast California to states like Idaho, which spend 2/3 of what California spends per student and yet gets far better outcomes than California does. California has the lowest rate of education attainment out of any state in the country.
The infrastructure is crumbling. New projects are consumed by consultant driven graft. Sacramento is generally paralyzed by special interests. The complete lack of action on homelessness is tragic for the absolute volume of human life just discarded on the side of the road. Gas prices are absolutely ridiculous and the state is hoarding tax dollars during grotesque inflation.
8 years ago.. I would have agreed, California may have been a little shabby, but it was still on a great track. Today I have far less faith in the state, particularly considering the Governor appears to be desirous of a presidential campaign and the state is about to be used as a prop in his endeavors.
> A single doctor at a single hospital developed this theory and then tested it. There is a foundation which is partly funded by the state, but they just promulgate the ideas... it's up to the hospitals to do the mortality review and apply what they've learned there. There's really no fingerprint of recent government efficiency to be found here.
I don't understand. Can you please provide citations for what you're trying to say?
> CMQCC was founded in 2006 at Stanford University School of Medicine together with the State of California in response to rising maternal mortality and morbidity rates. Since CMQCC’s inception, California has seen maternal mortality decline by 65 percent between 2006 to 2016, while the national maternal mortality rate continued to rise.
https://www.cmqcc.org/who-we-are
If you read through the links, you'll see that the Californian Government has made substantial investments in maternal mortality and perinatal care which has resulted in this staggering decline. The resources of the state were mobilized with the help of the best evidence backed medicine to save lives. That's a great outcome!
> What connection is there between government efficiency and life span of citizens? This is a minefield of variables.
It's not about efficiency as much as it is about policy. No large organization is efficient; rather they ought to be measured by their effectiveness.
Investment in hospitals, clinics and public health. Reductions in environmental emissions (air pollution dramatically reduces lifespans). Expansion of coverage programs like medicaid via systems like medi-cal; https://www.medi-cal.ca.gov/ Ensuring access to clean drinking water, adequate sanitation - https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/11/23/9379451... . Preventing dumping of toxic waste. Public vaccination programs. And the many, many other levers governments can pull to ensure that people live longer and are healthier.
> Aren't minimum wages significantly different between California and Texas? Wasn't this phased in around that time? How much of this increase is due to this?
In the comment, the study compares California and Texas between 2000 to 2020.
I am not a specialist on the rest, and do not have the data on hand, but just a note, American infrastructure is crumbling in general due to a receding of the state from infrastructure investments.
Could you please provide a citation and explanation for your Idaho comment?
> If I was to sum up my position here, it's this. You get what you pay for.
I lived in California for years before I moved to London 3 years ago. I agree that California does a lot of things better than some states and there's an element of "you get what you pay for." But I think that doesn't let California off the hook for the value they return on the money they collect.
Between federal tax, state tax, social security and all the zany other taxes (CA SDI, etc), the tax rate you pay in California is very close to what you pay in the UK or a lot of other European countries. If you own a home, add in yearly property tax which is similar to what you'd pay in UK council tax.
But in London, you get 100% free healthcare (including all medications at a nominal fee), fantastic public transit, weekly trash/recycling pick-up from your local council, extensive council housing to actually house low-income people, etc. The same money is getting more done. I'm not claiming it's perfect or can't be improved, but the services you get for paying roughly the same tax rate are significantly higher (and the same applies in many other cities in Europe).
I think a lot of people in the US don't realize that CA taxes are essentially at the same level as many countries in Europe. So I have at least a little sympathy for people who throw their hands up and move to a low tax, low service state like Texas when they feel like they aren't getting a European level of services for a European level of taxes.
I think some of the inefficiency in California stems from the proposition system where large pots of money are allocated to seemingly good causes but it ties the hands of government who are trying to manage the overall budget efficiently. The amount of propositions included in every voting cycle is comical and in my opinion it is just shifting the work of detailed governance onto the general public who has neither the time nor the expertise to decide on a lot of the issues presented at the level of detail required.
Reddit user lists all the reasons why California policies lead to the best health and life expectancy outcomes in the United States: https://www.reddit.com/r/bestof/comments/up7wei/uinconvenien...
Like i said before, this is wishful thinking, but it’s not for lack of resources.
Alexander Hamilton. On california of course
That's why almost 12% of the US population chooses to live in California right?
The last time a Republican had any presence in California was 30 years ago and the Dems have driven this state off a cliff. Why do Californians still keep falling for the same grift election after election? It doesn't matter who you vote for, all they do is steal from the people for their own gain and we keep voting for them because they give us lip service on particular causes.
What Prop 13 does is stop retired families from being forced to move out. The retired families in my neighborhood would have to pay $4000+/month in property tax. What will it be in 2030 or 2040? The only thing keeping things sane are things like Prop 13.
And don't forget, Pelosi, in all her glory, was trying to add back in the SALT tax exceptions to the Biden bills earlier this year. Why would she do that except to reward all her rich donors in CA?
Nothing would change except homeowners would get crushed by property taxes and especially given the horrific income inequality in California, all the middle and lower income families would get destroyed.
Thank God for Prop 13, it's the last vestige of income equality for Californians.