California News
The Nortax and California ~ 52% Tax
From HotAir:
Whether it’s because we end up going over the fiscal cliff or because Republicans agree to President Obama’s plan of not extending the Bush tax cuts on America’s wealthiest earners, the possibility of an effective tax hike means that higher-income Californians may be in for a whopping aggregate marginal tax rate. The super-liberal state already succeeded in approving their own rate hike with Proposition 30 in the November election, and combined with the potential federal raises, they could be looking at a top bracket with a marginal income tax rate of just under 52 percent:
Gerald Prante, an economics professor at Lynchburg College in Virginia, and Austin John, a Lynchburg economics student, calculated marginal tax rates — the highest rates on the highest levels of income — for all 50 states. They combined state, federal and, where applicable, local income taxes, plus payroll taxes for Social Security and Medicare and included the deductibility of some taxes.
Proposition 30 added three percentage points to the marginal state income tax rate for California’s highest-income taxpayers, bringing it to 13.3 percent. That action raised California over other high-tax jurisdictions to a marginal rate of 51.9 percent, slightly higher than New York City’s level. Hawaii was the only other place with a calculated rate above 50 percent.
California Becoming the New Detroit? PLUS: California Sales Tax Revenue Drops 33.5%
Powerline Blog posted a good story on the downward spiral Democrats are bringing our fair state:
Dickens needs to be updated: it’s a tale of two states. As Victor Davis Hansen writes, there is no California any more: “Driving across California is like going from Mississippi to Massachusetts without ever crossing a state line.” But even the coastal enclaves show signs of weakness. The Journal notes that even Silicon Valley is showing weaknesses. There have been considerable layoffs in the old-line semiconductor industry. True, Apple is about to open a new facility with 3,600 jobs—in Texas. Jerry Brown is was counting on the Facebook IPO to provide a fillip to the state’s coffers through capital gains taxes like the good old days of the Internet bubble of the 1990s, but with the Facebook faceplant, that is proving to be another wistful dream. So instead Jerry hopes to raise income taxes on—wait for it—just the rich, in a ballot initiative this November. He’ll pitch it as the only way to avoid deep cuts to schools, public safety, and so forth, and I hope the opponents of the measure will have the wit to show renderings of the high-speed rail to nowhere that the state’s voters have turned against as a sign of Brown’s real tax and spend priorities.
Robert J. Cristino points out at NewGeography.com that California is rapidly becoming “the new Detroit,” with this important parallel:
Like Detroit, California now has one party rule. The Democrats of California did not need a single Republican vote to pass their budget. Governor Brown’s plan is to address the nation’s largest deficit by raising taxes instead of cutting spending. If passed, the deficit would drop from $20 billion to a mere $16 billion. The budget does nothing to cure the systemic problems of a bloated bureaucracy. It does not eliminate one of California’s 519 state agencies.
Breitbart has this story as well about the tax revenues in this state o’mine:
The state has avoided default by temporarily borrowing from state trust funds, but those accounts will soon need their cash back to continue operating. Today California quickly began trying to sell $10 billion in municipal bonds to fund the record $28 billion they need to keep the lights on. With tax revenue plummeting and the state already the second lowest rated credit in the country, if the independent credit rating agencies downgrade the state to “junk bond”, California will be short up to $18 billion and default.
[….]
The governor justified signing the budget based on the twin assumption that the California economy was expanding and the voters would approve his tax initiative that would raise $8.5 billion. Many analysts doubted the voters willingness to vote to raise sales tax on themselves, but we were virtually alone in warning California’s shallow economic recovery had peaked and the state was at risk for a double dip recession.
State Controller John Chiang tried to rationalize that even though California revenues were “disappointingly” down $475 million in July: “However, because spending appears to be tracking and the funds that the State depends on for liquidity are performing well, California’s cash outlook remains stable.” This is sort of like the pilot of a jumbo jet announcing to the passengers that as a safety precaution they may want to cross your arms over your calves and grab your ankles and to brace yourself for possible impact.
This is similar to an earlier story I did about the 22% drop in Revenues:
State Controller John Chaing continues to uphold the California Great Seal Motto of “Eureka”, i.e., ‘I have found it’. But what Chaing is finding as Controller is that California’s economy as measured by tax revenues is still tanking. Compared to last year, State tax collections for February shriveled by $1.2 billion or 22%. The deterioration is more than double the shocking $535 million reported decline for last month. The cumulative fiscal year decline is $6.1 billion or down 11% versus this period in 2011.
While California Governor Brown promises strong economic growth is just around the corner, Chaing proves that the best way for Sacramento politicians to hurt the economy and thereby generate lower tax revenue, is to have the highest tax rates in the nation.
California politicians seem delusional in their continued delusion that high taxes have not savaged the State’s economy. Each month’s disappointment is written off as due to some one-time event.
The State Controller’s office did acknowledge that higher than normal tax refunds for February might have reduced the collection of some personal income taxes. Given that 2012 has an extra day in February for leap year, there might have been one day more of tax refunds sent out. But the Controller’s report shows personal income tax collections fell by $325 million, or 16% versus last year. Furthermore, leap year would have added another day for retail sales and use tax collection, but those revenues also fell during February-by an even larger $813 million, 25% decline from 2011.
The more likely reason tax collections continue falling is that businesses and successful people are leaving California for the better tax rates available in more pro-business states.
Derisively referred to as “Taxifornia” by the independent Pacific Research Institute, California wins the booby prize for the highest personal income taxes in the nation and higher sales tax rates than all but four other states. Though Californians benefit from Proposition 13 restrictions on how much their property tax can increase in one year, the state still has the worst state tax burden in the U.S.
Spectrum Locations Consultants recorded 254 California companies moved some or all of their work and jobs out of state in 2011, 26% more than in 2010 and five times as many as in 2009. According SLC President, Joe Vranich: the “top ten reasons companies are leaving California: 1) Poor rankings in surveys 2) More adversarial toward business 3) Uncontrollable public spending 4) Unfriendly business climate 5) Provable savings elsewhere 6) Most expensive business locations 7) Unfriendly legal environment for business 8) Worst regulatory burden 9) Severe tax treatment 10) Unprecedented energy costs.
Going Out of Business! AFTERBURNER
Video Description:
That which cannot continue, will not continue. Does this adage apply to California? Could California simply go out of business? Bill Whittle tells you a cautionary tale about the California government and how it is driving high tech businesses to Texas at the same time that it is building trains to nowhere. Is the California government going to bring the rest of the United States down a path to fiscal ruin?
I will post Bill’s videos I missed in the side-bar to your right.
California’s War on Cars and Single Family Homes ~ e.g., eco-fascism
In the above presentation, Bill Whittle mentions Burt Rutan. His critique is here: PDF. I found it via a small bio done by Right Fan-Girl:
Burt Rutan, in case any of my readers are unaware is the guy that designed and built the Spaceship one spacecraft, and designed and built the voyager airplane that flew nonstop around the world. He is an absolute genius, pioneer, and generally a hero of the mind. So when I heard that he had taken a stance on a thing, I am inclined to pay attention, this is a guy that does things that work.
I started reading, and the first thing that jumped out at me is the title. “An Engineer’s Critique of Global Warming, Science” Now, this is something that I have been struggling with for decades. As many of you know, I am a civil engineer. In engineering, things have to work, so we are far far more parsimonious with what we accept as valid. We do not have the luxury of simply saying “well, the science should work out”, no, people die when engineers do that, so we accept only theories that have survived extensive testing, models that have proven exhaustively that they predict accurately, etcetera.
Anyway, this powerpoint is worth the perusing if anyone’s interested in why a well-educated intelligent person remains a skeptic on AGW.
The WSJ article about this war shows just how “fascistic” this movement is:
My April 9 Cross Country column commentary in The Wall Street Journal (California Declares War on Suburbia) outlined California’s determination to virtually outlaw new detached housing. The goal is clear: force most new residents into multi-family buildings at 20 and 30 or more to the acre. California’s overly harsh land use regulations had already driven housing affordability from fairly typical levels to twice and even three times higher than that of much of the nation. California’s more recent tightening of the land use restrictions (under Assembly Bill 32 and Senate Bill 375) has been justified as necessary for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.
It is funny that a friend of mine loves classic cars but wholly endorses this movement:
…”68 percent of new housing in Southern California by 2035 would be condos and apartments,” despite the fact that census data shows that 80 percent of that region’s housing increase between 2000 and 2010 were single-family homes, indicating a clear preference for less dense housing. Planners believe that forcing people into a high-density housing will alleviate global warming by reducing the use of cars (Tulsa beacon)
Here is a 6-part presentation by Burt:
Lord Jerry Brown Looks To His Serfs To Work on High Speed Rail
An amazing statement (above) from Jerry brown. He views us as serfs, is he our lord?
- Serfs lived in small communities called manors that were ruled by a local lord or vassal. Most peasants were serfs. They were bound to the manor and could not leave it or marry without the manor lord’s permission. Serfs did all the work on the manor farm: they worked the fields, cared for the livestock, built and maintained the buildings, made the clothing, and cut firewood. Men, women, and children worked side by side. Serfs had small plots of land they could work for themselves; sometimes a serf saved enough money to buy his freedom and became a freeman.
Cost Side:
(WSJ – May 18, 2012) California’s budget deficit has grown by $7 billion in the last four months. Uh oh. The good news in this debacle is that the state’s fiscal woes will make it nearly impossible to complete Governor Jerry Brown’s runaway high-speed rail train. The bad news is that the Governor is going to try anyway.
Transportation experts warn that the 500-mile bullet train from San Francisco to Los Angeles could cost more than $100 billion, though the Governor pegs the price at a mere $68 billion. The state has $12.3 billion in pocket, $9 billion from the state and $3.3 billion from…
HotAir continues:
This weekend the Wall Street Journal reports that our earlier estimation was in error. The financing isn’t “risky” at all… it’s an unmitigated disaster.
The good news in this debacle is that the state’s fiscal woes will make it nearly impossible to complete Governor Jerry Brown’s runaway high-speed rail train. The bad news is that the Governor is going to try anyway.
Transportation experts warn that the 500-mile bullet train from San Francisco to Los Angeles could cost more than $100 billion, though the Governor pegs the price at a mere $68 billion. The state has $12.3 billion in pocket, $9 billion from the state and $3.3 billion from the feds, but Mr. Brown hasn’t a clue where he’ll get the rest. Maybe he’s hoping Facebook will buy the train, though he’ll have a hard time convincing Mark Zuckerberg that it’s worth 100 Instagrams.
As the WSJ article goes on to point out, voters were originally sold on putting up $9B in bonds to fund the project on the promise that it would “only” cost $33B in total and that a combination of federal dollars and private investments would make up the rest. But Washington is facing something of a cash crunch itself, in case you hadn’t heard, and no investment firms want to pony up any money without some assurance of revenue down the road. It’s simply not happening.
As HotAir admits:
- ….I remain a fan of rail travel, partly because I hate flying and partly from a sense of nostalgia I suppose. And I’m still hopeful that projects like this may yet come to fruition in places where they make sense. The Northeast corridor from Boston to Washington, DC still looks like it could support a high speed rail project if it were implemented intelligently. But California has neither the money nor the culture to support it….
Same-Sex Matters (Race and Gender in Marriage)
(This audio is a FLASHBACK from JUNE 17, 2008) The only reason I know that is because of the reference to this L.A. Times article, “The Right to Love” (Reproduced in full in the appendix)
I wanted to share here some conversation and further thinking on a topic that was discussed vigorously amongst friends while partaking in choice hops this past Halloween weekend. The below is written in conversation style (almost all my posts are like this) for friends. So it will seem personal at times.
A plea for friends who are in relationships… this is meant for continued deeper reflection. Take your time and reflect thoughtfully and if discussed amongst yourselves, discuss civilly. Through all the conversation, know that right now in California civil partnerships hold all the legal equality (taxes, health-care coverage, hospital visits, etc) to marriage. So the push to have “same-sex marriage” isn’t about “equality,” it’s about ideology.
Also keep in mind that I am not in any way under the impression that a simple conversation like this will undue many years of thinking on a matter/subject. (You or Myself.) I would rather you at the least be introduced to a side of an issue that maybe you haven’t heard of before. This introduction to other arguments may be long and tedious. TAKE YOUR TIME (*caps not yelling but said for impact*). Great theories and coming to positions (spiritual and political) on a matter take time and evolve, sometimes over years. Or at least they should be considered with weightiness and not merely adopted from university or parental influence.
I have no idea either what you may have been introduced to (for instance: Howard Zinn, the self admitted Marxist and historian whose historical viewpoint was born from Marx and Engels writings – on other words, his historical philosophy didn’t exist prior to the Communist Manifesto). This view of history tends to be popular at the university campus. In other words, many of our views are rooted in deeper worldviews and the peripheral views we hold may never change until you look a bit deeper into our worldview.
- (What does a worldview entail? Any “coherent worldview must be able to satisfactorily answer four questions: that of origin, meaning, morality, and destiny.” Another writer outs it thusly: “A Worldview is how one views or interprets reality. The German word is Weltanschauung, meaning a ‘world and life view,’ or ‘a paradigm.’ It is a framework through which or by which one makes sense of the data of life. A worldview makes a world of difference in one’s view of God, origins, evil, human nature, values, and destiny.” Raising one’s self-consciousness [awareness] about worldviews is an essential part of intellectual maturity.)
In my mind’s eye we are talking about peripheral positions that would be impacted more by a deeper look into how we view reality… something not often looked into by the general populace today (see my first chapter in my book). So again,
- I am more concerned about clarity than agreement in this conversation.
Many positions we hold as fact can be based in fallacious thinking. I will exemplify this by a topic that was brought up the other night, anthropogenic global warming (man caused global warming). History and science come together to disprove this theory. Not only has the “hockey stick” model that gave birth to this giant theory which was popularized by Al Gore [Britain’s courts referenced many lies in his presentation to not show it in public schools] has been torn to shreds science-wise, history shows the complete breakdown of the premise. For instance:
(1) Mars (Uncommon Descent h/t) has had a bout of global warming… last I checked Exxon doesn’t drill there;
(2) In the 8th century AD, the Roman Empire grew grapes used for wine on the slopes of Salisbury Plain (about 80 miles southwest of London) in the United Kingdom;
(3) The Vikings raiding and traveling the seas was made possible by the now frozen “Greenland”actually living up to its name;
(4) NASA‘s “fact” that 1998 was the warmest year (used by Al Gore) was disproved by an amateur mathematician;
(5) In 1970’s, at the first Earth Day rally, scientists, meteorologists and politicians all pushed a theory that there was Global Cooling (Time magazine for instance). While this theory wasn’t as embedded in popular thinking and scientific literature as is global warming, it was still the dominant theory of that time;
(6) There is more ice now that 29-years ago; Antarctic sea ice more than in 1979;
(7) In the 1500’s till the late 1800’s passages that are now iced over allowed for what is termed as the Northwest Passage… Exxon or cars weren’t around then?
“If you are like me and bit foggy on the Northwest Passage, here is a five cent refresher. The British coined the term Northwest Passage for the potential northern oceanic pass that would allow vessels to move between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. The earliest explorations for the fabled passage were by Cortes in 1539. The late 1500’s were marked by British explorers, Martin Frobisher, Humphrey Gilbert, and John Davis. Several expeditions followed, all with little success of finding the passage but tempered by the acquisition of new lands. Some attempts lead to deaths of entire crews. Notable of these is the Sir John Franklin expedition in which all of the crew members were lost to starvation, scurvy, cannibalism, and lead poisoning from food sealed in tins. The first to transverse the Northwest Passage was Sir Robert McClure using a combination of both sledge and ship. Ironically this was done during the search for Franklin’s team in which McClure’s own ship became trapped in the ice for three winters. The passage was finally conquered entirely by sea by the Norwegian Amundsen in 1906.”
(8) Acid rain scares of the 1980’s were mostly unfounded and not man-caused;
(9) On the northern side of Mammoth (in California), there are tree-lines that were preserved by a volcanic eruption in A.D. 1350. In this preserved tree-line there were seven species of tree that grew well above the current tree-line in this mountainous range. The Earth would have to be 3.2 degrees warmer (Celsius) in order for these particular trees to grow in this higher altitude.
So one can believe in man caused Global Warming, but the facts speak for themselves. (See my son’s 6th grade debate for Toast Masters for instance.) What would drive this view then? Patrick Moore, who you’ll remember is the co-founder of Green Peace, answers this important query, saying:
“I now find that many environmental groups have drifted into self-serving cliques with narrow vision and rigid ideology…. many environmentalists are showing signs of elitism, left-wingism, and downright eco-fascism. The once politically centrist, science-based vision of environmentalism has been largely replaced with extremist rhetoric. Science and logic have been abandoned and the movement is often used to promote other causes such as class struggle and anti-corporatism. The public is left trying to figure out what is reasonable and what is not.”
MOVING ON.
I almost wrote on the topic we spoke a bit about the other night back in September and wish I had, but instead I switched gears and wrote on the Left’s support for pedophilia (explicit and implicit) in their support of many groups who promote it – here in the united states and abroad (See: The Left / Islamo-Nazis / Homosexuality / Womens Rights / and Contradictions). I would like us to stay on just this topic if we can work though it.
Before getting to the main topic that we left last night about interracial marriage being illegal on the basis of color and homosexuality being equated to that [i.e., race], I wish to post some of what I said last night for record sake. This comes from a question asked of me by one of my son’s friends. He asked “What is your views on gays? Are they bad? Are they going to hell? Are you born this way?” (Question #3 from Q & A Session – PapaG Style) Most of what I talked about last night can be found in this post for clarity [updated a bit]:
….However, there is a “created order,” or, even a natural order (if you do not believe in God). My argument for heterosexual (between a man and a woman) unions is usable both by the atheist (non believer) and the theist (a believer in God – in the Judeo-Christian sense). Here is the crux of the matter in regards to “nature’s order:”
“…take gold as an example, it has inherent in its nature intrinsic qualities that make it expensive: good conductor of electricity, rare, never tarnishes, ease of use (moldability), and the like. The male and female have the potential to become a single biological organism, or single organic unit, or principle. Two essentially becoming one. The male and female, then, have inherent to their nature intrinsic qualities that two mated males or two mated females never actualize in their courtship… nor can they ever. The potential stays just that, potential, never being realized…..
“….Think of a being or animal or even an insect that reproduces, not by mating, but by some act performed by individuals. Imagine that for these same beings, movement and digestion is performed not by individuals, but only by the complementary pairs that unite for this purpose. Would anyone acquainted with such beings have difficulty understanding that in respect to movement and digestion, the organism is a united pair, or an organic unity? They thus become an entirely new organism when joined together — fulfilling what was only ‘potential’ when apart”
(adapted from Prof. George)
So you see, the two heterosexual organisms that join in a sexual union cease being two separate organisms for a short time and become one organism capable of reproduction. This is what the state and the church are sealing in a marriage, this intrinsic union. The homosexual couple can never achieve this union, so “natures order” has endowed the heterosexual union with an intrinsic quality that other relationships do not have or could never attain. Both the atheist and theist can argue from this point, because either we were created this way or we evolved this way. Either way, nature has imposed on the sexual union being discussed.
Also, I do not think it is wholly genetic. I believe choice is involved as well as violence. For instance, take this thought from a pro-choice, lesbian woman, Tammy Bruce:
“ . . . . and now all manner of sexual perversion enjoys the protection and support of once what was a legitimate civil-rights effort for decent people. The real slippery slope has been the one leading into the Left’s moral vacuum. It is a singular attitude that prohibits any judgment about obvious moral decay because of the paranoid belief that judgment of any sort would destroy the gay lifestyle, whatever that is…. I believe this grab for children by the sexually confused adults of the Gay Elite represents the most serious problem facing our culture today. . . . Here come the elephant again: Almost without exception, the gay men I know (and that’s too many to count) have a story of some kind of sexual trauma or abuse in their childhood — molestation by a parent or an authority figure, or seduction as an adolescent at the hands of an adult. The gay community must face the truth and see sexual molestation of an adolescent for the abuse it is, instead of the ‘coming-of-age’ experience many [gays] regard it as being. Until then, the Gay Elite will continue to promote a culture of alcohol and drug abuse, sexual promiscuity, and suicide by AIDS.”
What she is basically saying is that there are emotional reasons, usually trauma, or circumstances that push these young boys into the choices they make in regards to their sexuality. For instance, one of my co-workers is a homosexual man. He is a wonderful guy; I would invite him to my wedding if I could go back in time. He is very open about his past, he was “initiated” into the homosexual lifestyle by a grown black man when he was 14. In other words, he was raped. Whether he feels at this point in time that he consented is of no value to the conversation. He was not old enough to consent neither would this act by a family member, friend, or complete stranger be anything but rape. And this rape, at an age where boys are having surges of hormones and confused about a lot of things is what Tammy Bruce was speaking to. It is a psychological trauma that if not dealt with has negatively reverberating results in one’s life. To ignore the traumatic effects on a person’s life that an event like this has simply by “rubber stamping” the lifestyle that all too often is a consequence of violence does more harm (trauma) to the individual than simply asking society to stay within the classic definition of marriage.
This “trauma” sometimes works its way into sexual matters. There are many homosexual people, Al Rantel, to name a more popular one, that believe marriage should be kept between a man and a woman. Tammy Bruce wants it, but she, like most Republicans, want the states to decide, and not the Supreme Court.
Also, in 1993, the biggest march by the “gay” community (much thanks to a reader leaving a link to this article!) on Washington was held, and they had this as part of their platform:
The implications of homosexual, bisexual, and transgendered curriculum at all levels of education.
The lowering of the age [12 years old to be exact] of consent for homosexual and heterosexual sex.
The legalization of homosexual marriages.
Custody, adoption, and foster-care rights for homosexuals, lesbians, and transgendered people.
the redefinition of the family to include the full diversity of all family structures.
The access to all programs of the Boy Scouts of America.
Affirmative action for homosexuals.
The inclusion of sex-change operations under a universal health-care plan.
Obviously the Elite gay community Tammy Bruce spoke of knows which age is best for “recruiting,” e.g., traumatizing.
I will post three quotes from Tammy Bruce (a pro-choice lesbian):
Even if one does not necessarily accept the institutional structure of “organized religion,” the “Judeo-Christian ethic and the personal standards it encourages do not impinge on the quality of life, but enhance it. They also give one a basic moral template that is not relative,” which is why the legal positivists of the Left are so threatened by the Natural Law aspect of the Judeo-Christian ethic. (Tammy Bruce, The Death of Right and Wrong: Exposing the Left’s Assault on Our Culture and Values [Roseville: Prima, 2003], 35.)
…these problems don’t remain personal and private. The drive, especially since this issue is associated with the word “gay rights,” is to make sure your worldview reflects theirs. To counter this effort, we must demand that the medical and psychiatric community take off their PC blinders and treat these people responsibly. If we don’t, the next thing you know, your child will be taking a “tolerance” class explaining how “transexuality” is just another “lifestyle choice”…. After all, it is the only way malignant narcissists will ever feel normal, healthy, and acceptable: by remaking society – children – in their image (Ibid., 92, 206)
… and now all manner of sexual perversion enjoys the protection and support of once what was a legitimate civil-rights effort for decent people. The real slippery slope has been the one leading into the Left’s moral vacuum. It is a singular attitude that prohibits any judgment about obvious moral decay because of the paranoid belief that judgment of any sort would destroy the gay lifestyle, whatever that is…. I believe this grab for children by the sexually confused adults of the Gay Elite represents the most serious problem facing our culture today…. Here come the elephant again: Almost without exception, the gay men I know (and that’s too many to count) have a story of some kind of sexual trauma or abuse in their childhood — molestation by a parent or an authority figure, or seduction as an adolescent at the hands of an adult. The gay community must face the truth and see sexual molestation of an adolescent for the abuse it is, instead of the ‘coming-of-age’ experience many [gays] regard it as being. Until then, the Gay Elite will continue to promote a culture of alcohol and drug abuse, sexual promiscuity, and suicide by AIDS. (Ibid., 90. 99)
Many homosexuals stand against same-sex marriage. I document some in-depth views by a couple of politically astute gay persons reasons on why they stand against same-sex marriage (so it isn’t homophobia [#1], and [#2] it isn’t about a lack of “rights,” because these homosexual writers believe they are equal now). I also quote a well-known Canadian homosexual psychologist and sociologist on this topic:
Paul Nathanson, a sociologist, a scholar, and a homosexual writes that there are at least five functions that marriage serves–things that every culture must do in order to survive and thrive. They are (source):
- Foster the bonding between men and women
- Foster the birth and rearing of children
- Foster the bonding between men and children
- Foster some form of healthy masculine identity
- Foster the transformation of adolescents into sexually responsible adults
Note that Nathanson considers these points critical to the continued survival of any culture. He continues “Because heterosexuality is directly related to both reproduction and survival, … every human societ[y] has had to promote it actively . … Heterosexuality is always fostered by a cultural norm “that limits marriage to unions of men and women.” He adds that people “are wrong in assuming that any society can do without it.”
Read more: RPT Joy Behar vs. Homosexuals on Same-Sex Marriage
These are considerations often not addressed by the Left. But all this is not the main point I want to deal with, which is, race and sexual orientation.
Dennis Prager mentions the power of this argument with one of his few refutations of it:
The most effective of all morality-based arguments for same-sex marriage, the one that persuades more people than any other argument, is the one that equates opposition to same-sex marriage with the old opposition to interracial marriage.
The argument, repeated so often that it sounds incontestable, is this: Just as parts of American society once had immoral laws that forbade whites and blacks from marrying, so, today, society continues to have immoral laws forbidding men from marrying men and women from marrying women. And just as decent people overthrew the former, decent people must overthrow the latter.
Thanks in large part to widespread higher education — the higher the educational level, the more one is likely to hold this view — vast numbers of Americans believe in this equation of sex (gender) and race.
But the equation is false.
First, there is no comparison between sex and race.
There are enormous differences between men and women, but there are no differences between people of different races. Men and women are inherently different, but blacks and whites (and yellows and browns) are inherently the same. Therefore, any imposed separation by race can never be moral or even rational;
on the other hand, separation by sex can be both morally desirable and rational. Separate bathrooms for men and women is moral and rational; separate bathrooms for blacks and whites is not….
Read more: False Equation: Opposing Same-Sex Marriage and Opposing Interracial Marriage
(In the audio to the right, this first caller should be listened to, below is the visual of the discussion.)
That first reason is why almost all the black civil rights leaders that marched with Martin Luther King Jr. do not support this comparison. For instance,
APPENDIX
Average Household Income:
Homosexuals – $55,430 / African Americans – $12,166
Percentage of College Graduates:
Homosexuals – 60% / African Americans – 5%
Holding Professional Positions:
Homosexuals – 49% / African Americans – 1%
Taken Overseas Vacations:
Homosexuals – 66% / African Americans – 1%
Ever Denied the Right to Vote:
Homosexuals – No / African Americans – Yes
Ever Faced Legal Segregation:
Homosexuals – No / African Americans – Yes
Ever Denied Access to Public Restrooms:
Homosexuals – No / African Americans – Yes
Ever Denied Access to Businesses and Restaurants:
Homosexuals – No / African Americans – Yes
(Wall Street Journal, 7/18/91, B1)
Read more: RPT Homosexuality: Is It Good For Society? For The Individual?
In a New York Times article entitled, “Blacks Rejecting Gay Rights As a Battle Equal to Theirs,” we find some interesting supposed parallels made by the Left taken to task. For instance, Vernetta Adams, A balck 24-year-old woman and history major at the University of the District of Columbia said this, “I can’t go in a closet and hang up my race when it’s convenient…. Gays hid in the closet when they wanted to advance. Now they’re out and demanding rights and yelling ‘discrimination.'” The The Rev. Lou Sheldon intimates the reasons he thinks many in the gay community are making this parallel:
- “The reason gays are making parallels,” Mr. Sheldon said, “is that it may bring empathy from white men like me, who feel a collective sense of guilt about the way blacks have been treated. The fact remains that this is not a civil rights issue but a moral issue.”
This is the point that separates race from gender. That is, homosexuals have not been discriminated against:
Another argument for gay rights laws depends upon an analogy between homosexuals today and blacks before the civil rights movement. It claims that homosexuals similarly constitute a distinct and oppressed minority and that, although they do enjoy many civil liberties, they are nonetheless second-class citizens because people scorn and reject them out of prejudice. Hence, gay rights laws, modeled on civil rights statutes for blacks, should be enacted to correct this.
Yet the analogy is not sound. Homosexuals are not an oppressed minority in the way that blacks were. They have not suffered from imposed segregation, systematic economic deprivation, or denial of educational opportunities. Furthermore, they do not suffer from an inherited pattern of deprivation, since the homosexual condition is not passed from generation to generation like race or ethnicity. Rather, it has been well documented that homosexuals have, on average, incomes much higher than the national norm and that, on average, they receive several years more formal schooling than the typical American. They occupy thousands of positions of prestige and influence in business, academia, the professions, and the media. It cannot plausibly be maintained that they are an oppressed minority.
Michael Pakaluk, “Homosexuality and the Principle of Nondiscrimination,” 77-78, found in Christopher Wolfe, ed., Same-Sex Matters: The Challenge of Homosexuality [Dallas, TX: Spence Publishing, 2000].
Some discussion of the 3/5ths Clause in the Constitution came up as well. Frederick Douglas in his early years thought that this proved a “race bias” embedded in our country. Until that is, he read the Constitution and those writings of the authors of these sections and the debates (history) on such clauses:
Another point I make (in the post Homosexuality: Is it good for society? For the individual?) is that there is an issue before us:
- A liberal society might, then, find it prudent to ignore homosexuality. It might well deem it unwise to peer into private bedrooms. However, this is not the issue before us. Today the demand is that homosexuality be endorsed and promoted with the full power of the law. This would require us to abandon the standard of nature, the one standard that can teach us the difference between freedom and slavery, between right and wrong.
What is the “issue before us?” I will let professor Robert George talk about it further:
….Lawyers challenging traditional marriage laws liken their cause to Loving v. Virginia (which invalidated laws against interracial marriages), insinuating that conjugal-marriage supporters are bigots. This is ludicrous and offensive, and no one should hesitate to say so.
The definition of marriage was not at stake in Loving. Everyone agreed that interracial marriages were marriages. Racists just wanted to ban them as part of the evil regime of white supremacy that the equal protection clause was designed to destroy.
Opponents of racist laws in Loving did not question the idea, deeply embodied in our law and its shaping philosophical tradition, of marriage as a union that takes its distinctive character from being founded, unlike other friendships, on bodily unity of the kind that sometimes generates new life. This unity is why marriage, in our legal tradition, is consummated only by acts that are generative in kind. Such acts unite husband and wife at the most fundamental level and thus legally consummate marriage whether or not they are generative in effect, and even when conception is not sought.
Of course, marital intercourse often does produce babies, and marriage is the form of relationship that is uniquely apt for child-rearing (which is why, unlike baptisms and bar mitzvahs, it is a matter of vital public concern). But as a comprehensive sharing of life—an emotional and biological union—marriage has value in itself and not merely as a means to procreation. This explains why our law has historically permitted annulment of marriage for non-consummation, but not for infertility; and why acts of sodomy, even between legally wed spouses, have never been recognized as consummating marriages.
Only this understanding makes sense of all the norms—annulability for non-consummation, the pledge of permanence, monogamy, sexual exclusivity—that shape marriage as we know it and that our law reflects. And only this view can explain why the state should regulate marriage (as opposed to ordinary friendships) at all—to make it more likely that, wherever possible, children are reared in the context of the bond between the parents whose sexual union gave them life.
If marriage is redefined, its connection to organic bodily union—and thus to procreation—will be undermined. It will increasingly be understood as an emotional union for the sake of adult satisfaction that is served by mutually agreeable sexual play. But there is no reason that primarily emotional unions like friendships should be permanent, exclusive, limited to two, or legally regulated at all. Thus, there will remain no principled basis for upholding marital norms like monogamy….
(Gay Marriage, Democracy, and the Courts: The Culture War Will Never End If Judges Invalidate The Choices Of Voters – Wall Street Journal)
While the following may be a bit graduate level, it is worth reading and digesting, as it makes similar points to the above comments by Robert George in the article he wrote, but it looks at the health of society. Like I said, you should take your time, follow through on some of the links, which would be equivalent to a small book being read. The following is taken from the chapter of my book entitled, Roman Epicurean’ism – Natural Law and Homosexuality (this section starts on page 14 if you wish to follow the references):
“Civil” Wars
The very heart of natural law is the family, for the distinction of male and female is at the very origin of our divinely ordained (e.g., created) social nature.[85] “Deviation from the ordained goal of heterosexual intercourse within marriage therefore strikes at the very heart of natural law.”[86] Civil marriage, then, exists merely to recognize a pre-existing social institution presupposing a created order vis-à-vis natural law tradition. “The state does not create marriage – it merely recognizes it. Marriage, in its truest sense, is neither a civil institution nor a religious one, but a natural institution. The complimentarity of male and female is an essential part of its nature.”[87] You see, the state has a vested interest in the family unit. If people could not have children, then the state would not be involved in the legal aspect of such a private contract. Michael Pakaluk, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Clark University, uses Justice John Harlan’s[88] dissention in the Poe v. Ullman to point out that “society… has traditionally concerned itself with the moral soundness of its people.”[89] He continues:
The laws regarding marriage which provide both when the sexual powers may be used and the legal and societal context in which children are born and brought up, as well as laws forbidding adultery, fornication, and homosexual practices which express the negative of the proposition, confining sexuality to lawful marriage, form a pattern so deeply pressed into the substance of our social life that any Constitutional doctrine in this area must build upon that basis.[90]
Professor Pakaluk builds on theme of societal interest in the moral framework of the family structure and why it matters to a healthy society. He gives three areas of concern that said healthy society should be involved:
1. the state has an interest in promoting the family because the family is the only reliable source of good citizens—of men and women with civic virtues, goodwill towards others, peaceable habits of association, and virtues of thrift and hard work. It therefore has an interest in discouraging sexual activity that is harmful to family life.
2. the state needs to insure that the rights of all of its citizens are protected, especially those of children, but children have a right to be raised within an intact family (or, strictly speaking, being deprived of an intact family without grave reason). It follows that the state has an interest in regulating sexual activity so that children are conceived and raised within stable families.
3. the state has an interest in encouraging its citizens to master their sexual desires. This is an obvious and important point, but strangely it is frequently overlooked today. Inordinate sexual desire is clearly as capable of dominating and enslaving people as are greed, power, alcohol, and drugs. Desire not infrequently drives people to neglect their responsibilities, to use power illicitly, to abuse the rights of others, to betray others, to lie, even to commit murder. Disordered sexual desire is often directly linked to depression, listlessness, and rage. Clearly, a tranquil civic order can be established only among citizens who have achieved a good degree of sexual self-control, and the state clearly has an interest in promoting this.[91]
This interest for a healthy society was born out of how pagan societies crumbled under the weight of licentiousness and the view of women as second-class citizen’s. Harold Berman makes this point when he writes that,
In pagan cultures in which polygamy, arranged marriages, and oppression of women predominated, the church promoted the idea of monogamous marriage by free consent of both spouses. In the West this idea had to do battle with deeply rooted tribal, village, and feudal customs. By the tenth century ecclesiastical synods were promulgating decrees concerning the matrimonial bond, adultery, legitimacy of children, and related matters; nevertheless, children continued to be married in the cradle and family relations continued to be dominated by the traditional folkways and mores of the Germanic, Celtic, and other peoples of western Europe. In the folklaw of the European peoples, as in the classical Roman law, marriage between persons of different classes (for example, free and slave, citizens and foreigners) was prohibited. Also divorce was at the will of either spouse—which usually meant, in practice, at the will of the husband. There were not even any formal requirements for divorce. Paternal consent was required for a marriage to be valid. Few obligations between the spouses were conceived in legal terms.[92]
So there was a progression from Pagan rights for women, which were basically none, to a protection and equalization under a more Christianized system. It is this system that is being undermined in redefining marriage. What is meant by this is that marriage between a man and woman is not an institution created by the state. As philosopher Michael Pakaluk argues, “[it] is an objective reality prior to the state.” If it is merely an institution created by the state, the case used by same-sex advocates (Loving v. Virginia) to equate homosexual marriage to race falls apart:
There are several implications that follow from this. For example, Pakaluk points out that “parental authority must stand or fall with marriage.” For “if the bond of husband and wife is not by nature, then neither is the government of those who share in that bond over any children that might result.” Consequently, “laws recognizing gay marriage imply, similarly, that parents have no objective and natural authority over their children, prior to the state.”6 This would mean that parents would have no natural right, no actual moral grounds, to object to the public schools teaching their children lessons about human sexuality that are contrary to the lessons taught in church and home. The state, of course, may grant an exception to these “backward” parents, but not because they have a prelegal obligation to care for and nurture their children in shaping their character and directing their moral compass. Rather, the state may consider it politically wise to tolerate these families and their religious traditions. But it would not be as a matter of principle based on the order and nature of things.
Ironically, if this view of marriage were dominant in our legal culture when the Supreme Court rejected the prohibition of interracial marriage in the case of Loving v. Virginia (1967), the moral grounds for its opinion would have been lost.7 That is, in order for the Court to have concluded that forbidding interracial marriage is wrong, it would have to know what marriage is. But if marriage is merely a social construction and not a natural institution, the state of Virginia could have argued, like contemporary same-sex marriage proponents, that marriage is merely a social construction subject to our will and nothing more. It is only because the Court knew that marriage is between a man and a woman that it could say that race, like height, geography, or place of residence, is not a relevant characteristic for two people to marry.
Francis Beckwith, “Legal Neutrality and Same-Sex Marriage,” Philosophia Christi [vol. 7, no. 1]: Downloadable PDF
This “right to love” (which is separate from marriage) is discussed further by Dennis Prager and others. Before ending with some audio, another issue that may be embedded in your mind is that Christianity has enslaved women more than freed them. This misconception – common on the university campus – is another historical misconception. You may see this on pages 12-18 of my chapter entitled Gnostic Feminism – Empowered to Fail. A very important read to understand the protections that came from the Judeo-Christian worldview ultimately afforded to women almost from the conception of the Christian faith and later embedded in Western legal tradition. It is this tradition being undermined and the human rights homosexual persons and women have fought so hard for for centuries. If one rejects this American experiment founded in the rights of their Creator, then one rejects the rights found in this same document. Reverting back to the same positions that treated women and homosexuals in a less than demeaning manner is self-destructive and well, if you will forgive me, juvenile. Juvenile not in a negative way, but needing more input that is outside you normative “sounding board.”
Some important audio. Again, this topic is one I expect you to set aside some time for. Maybe a year even? I will politely keep you on track. The reason for this is that the typical position is reached on the Left some say merely by feeling. I am challenging you to leave the world of feelings and to put your feelings up against reasoned positions. Some of this will be religious in nature, but not in legal terms. What do I mean by this? Theologian Wayne Grudem explains the often mischaracterized cross-pollination of the religious with legal:
1. It fails to distinguish the reasons for a law from the content of the law
Such “exclude religion” arguments are wrong because marriage is not a religion! When voters define marriage, they are not establishing a religion. In the First Amendment, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” the word “religion” refers to the church that people attend and support. “Religion” means being a Baptist or Catholic or Presbyterian or Jew. It does not mean being married. These arguments try to make the word “religion” in the Constitution mean something different from what it has always meant.
These arguments also make the logical mistake of failing to distinguish the reasons for a law from the content of the law. There were religious reasons behind many of our laws, but these laws do not “establish” a religion. All major religions have teachings against stealing, but laws against stealing do not “establish a religion.” All religions have laws against murder, but laws against murder do not “establish a religion.” The campaign to abolish slavery in the United States and England was led by many Christians, based on their religious convictions, but laws abolishing slavery do not “establish a religion.” The campaign to end racial discrimination and segregation was led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., a Baptist pastor, who preached against racial injustice from the Bible. But laws against discrimination and segregation do not “establish a religion.”
If these “exclude religion” arguments succeed in court, they could soon be applied against evangelicals and Catholics who make “religious” arguments against abortion. Majority votes to protect unborn children could then be invalidated by saying these voters are “establishing a religion.” And, by such reasoning, all the votes of religious citizens for almost any issue could be found invalid by court decree! This would be the direct opposite of the kind of country the Founding Fathers established, and the direct opposite of what they meant by “free exercise” of religion in the First Amendment.
(Wayne Grudem, Politics According to the Bible [Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2010],31.)
In other words, one needs to make some “subject” “object” distinctions herein. Knowing that just because one’s view is religious or secular does not necessarily exclude her of his view from the panoply of legal tradition. A quick note about another small topic that cropped up. If you are unaware of the horrible consequences of polygamy, I have some books and DVD documentaries that you are more than welcome to borrow that can increase your understanding of the psychological and positional destruction of children and women in these cultures:
- Escape, by Carolyn Jessop;
- Shattered Dreams: My Life as a Polygamist Wife, by Irene Spencer;
- Stolen Innocence: My Story of Growing Up in a Polygamouse Sect, Becoming a Teengae Bride, and Breaking Free of Warren Jeffs, by Elissa Wall;
- Banking on Heaven: Polygamy in the Heartland of the American West (DVD);
- Lifting the Veil of Polygamy (DVD);
- Escaping Polygamy: ABC Primetime Investigation (DVD).
APPENDIX ~ L.A. TIMES
Across California today, in mass public weddings and in small, private services, gay and lesbian couples will exchange official vows of undying love and wedlock. With the sanction of the state Supreme Court, these couples stand together as full citizens at last.
Their long odyssey to reach this day serves to remind us why people marry at all, especially in an era of casual relationships. As any married person can attest, marriage is significant precisely because it is difficult. True, it confers certain public protections, but even more, it requires personal sacrifices. If mutual affection and appreciation were enough to sustain relationships across the years, there would be no need for solemn vows of fidelity. Those vows protect many a marriage through many a rough patch; when two people agree to enter into such a union, it by rights should carry the name and honor of marriage, whether it’s between people of opposite sex or between a man and a man, or a woman and a woman.
Opponents of same-sex marriage often deplore this expansion of the meaning of marriage because they view it as threatening to traditional unions. As they use this day as a rallying point for a proposed amendment to the state Constitution to ban such marriages, it’s time to ask them directly: How does marriage of one type threaten others? Why do many heterosexuals feel that the beauty of their own marriage vows is in no way changed by today’s weddings, while others feel theirs have somehow been diminished?
Perhaps the next few months will ease these fears, as same-sex couples begin their married lives together. Those couples will settle into communities without disorder or threat; they will bring legal protection to their bonds of love. Those bonds can only be good for society — children gain from being raised by married parents, and communities are stronger when residents are legally committed to one another. As more and more Californians marry, society will grow stronger, not weaker.
That’s no doubt why opponents sought a stay of the court’s ruling until after the election. They know that as same-sex marriages become commonplace, the fears about them will fade, and eventually we will wonder what all the fuss was about. In the meantime, opponents will resort to hyperbole and fear. Take this missive last week from the Alliance for Marriage, issued in response to the announcement that the state of New York would recognize the unions performed in California:
“The governor of New York state will declare hundreds of years of marriage law in New York to be null and void. … The governor of New York state will force California-style ‘gay marriage’ on all the families and children of his own state.”
It’s a fairly reliable indicator of a bad argument when its proponent is forced to overstate the case in order to make it. The above surely qualifies. Same-sex couples are not upending the institution of marriage; nor are their supporters. Rather, they are engaged in a profoundly conservative act: They ask not to abolish marriage but to uphold it.
Some religious organizations won’t perform these marriages or recognize these unions — that’s their constitutional right. But the government, which has obligations of equity, may not engage in the discrimination that religions are allowed. As long as it bestows the privileges of marriage on some couples, it must bestow them on all.
In California, the initiative process allows voters to amend the state Constitution directly, and unfortunately, a measure on the November ballot will give them the chance. The question won’t be whether same-sex marriage is right or wrong — that’s a matter of personal conviction — but whether those who believe it is wrong should have the power to deny marriage to those who seek its protections.
Put another way: Many Californians undoubtedly object to unwed couples who have and raise children together, but no constitutional amendment prevents that, whatever the moral calculus.
To those who insist that an unevolving morality undergirds our state and federal constitutions, we remind them that not so long ago, many Americans believed with passionate conviction that it was a sin, a threat to families and a violation of the law for people of different races to marry.
The 1959 ruling of a Virginia state court judge to deny this right to a black woman and a white man aptly summarized the fervor with which opponents of miscegenation drew on tradition and religion to support their views:
“Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents,” trial judge Leon Bazile wrote. “And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix.”
The U.S. Supreme Court struck down that ruling in 1967; on that happy day, 16 states were forced to abandon their laws banning interracial marriage. Today, interracial couples go about their lives without legal threat; some no doubt still feel the sting of disapproval. But those who would look askance on those lawfully wedded couples do so without the state to reinforce their bigotry. Our courts, certainly our supreme courts, exist not to assess God’s will but to enforce the precepts of our constitutions, including the insistence that all Americans — black or white, male or female, straight or gay — are entitled to equal protection and the due process of our laws.
The California Supreme Court affirmed that principle last month and delivered the eloquent basis for today’s ceremonies. As the state’s voters watch the celebrations in the coming months, they should enjoy the sight of fellow citizens availing themselves of a public institution, that of marriage. These celebrations allow us to share in the newlyweds’ happiness, to join in acknowledging a milestone of joy and lifelong commitment. And they prompt at least one more question for those who disapprove: How can the state’s blessing on these acts of love in any way diminish us?
Bad News Squared ~ California
From HotAir:
The weekend produced a spate of dang-this-is-bad articles on the economic situation in California. Steven Greenhut’s for the Orange County Register is entitled “California to middle class: drop dead.” At The Daily Beast, Joel Kotkin laments that “As California Collapses, Obama Follows its Lead.” (H/t – and a “Read it, people!” shout-out – to Ed Driscoll at PJM.)
But what does all this look like in terms of numbers? What’s the how much and where and whom of the Golden State collapse? Perhaps the most interesting and telling thing is that it really is as bad as it looks. And the reasons are pretty much what you’d expect. Here’s the California story, in numbers.
According to a March 2012 report, 855,000 is how many private-sector jobs California has lost since the recession started four years ago. (H/t: California Political News & Views.) The state today enjoys an unemployment rate of 11%, compared with the official national average of 8.3%
Texas, by contrast, has added 139,800 jobs, posting the biggest absolute gain among the 50 states. (California’s is the biggest absolute loss.) Texas’ unemployment rate is 7.1%.
[….]
But we were talking about California. How does California rank in terms of the average state and local tax burden? According to the Tax Foundation, in 2009, California had the 6th heaviest tax burden in the nation, at 10.6%. (New Jersey was #1, followed by New York at #2.) That’s the in-state tax burden, of course. Federal taxes are on top of that.
Of course, business climate comprises more than the average individual tax burden. The Tax Foundation looks at five forms of taxation – corporate tax, individual income tax, sales tax, property tax, and unemployment insurance tax – to index the business climates of the 50 states. By this combined measure, the Tax Foundation ranks California 48th in business climate. (New York is 49th, and New Jersey 50th.)
State regulatory environment? George Mason University’s Mercatus Center ranks the Golden State 48th in the nation. New Jersey and New York are numbers 49 and 50, respectively.
How about other business costs? California had the 5th highest state premium ranking for worker compensation insurance costs in 2010 (although the state’s position improved slightly in 2011 due to other states raising their state premiums).
California ranks 7th highest in electric utility costs, with Hawaii being the highest, followed by Connecticut and Alaska.
According to the Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council, California has the third-highest per-gallon gasoline tax (Connecticut and New York are #1 and #2) and by far the highest tax on diesel, at 52.5 cents per gallon. (Some numbers below also come from the SB&EC report.)
California perennially has the second-highest gasoline prices at the pump (Hawaii is #1), although the state has regularly been ranked 3rd or 4th in oil production in recent years. (In the past week the statewide average was $4.15 for a gallon of regular, down from $4.36 a month ago.) In spite of having the third largest oil and gas reserves of any state in the nation, California is ranked dead last among all US jurisdictions for global oil investment. The fact that California hasn’t issued a new offshore drilling permit for over 30 years is undoubtedly a factor, as is the fact that the Monterey Shale Oil Field, which holds 64% of all the recoverable shale oil in the United States, is hamstrung by lawsuits, a typical condition in the state for both drilling and refining operations.
In spite of the state’s natural bounty, California produces only 37% of its statewide oil consumption. The rest comes from other states and countries, at added expense.
In terms of the employer burden of health-insurance mandates, California is 9th among the 50 states and the District of Columbia. (Rhode Island, Maryland, and Minnesota have the highest burdens.)
Meanwhile, California ranks 4th highest in state and local government spending per capita. The District of Columbia is the highest, followed by Alaska, Wyoming, and New York.
Ah, yes, state spending. California has by far the largest debt of any US state, at around $612 billion with state and local debt and pension liabilities included. In terms of raw numbers, New York posts a pathetic second place with only $305 billion. The size of California’s population allows the Golden State to slip to only 7th place in terms of per capita state and local debt. The District of Columbia walks off with another prize in this category, having on the books 85% more debt per capita than the 50-state average.
The California debt spiral is due in part to the steep decline in state tax revenues. The 22% year-on-year decline observed in February 2012 doesn’t tell the whole story either; California had already posted dramatic revenue losses in business and property taxes between 2007 and 2010. Business-tax revenues dropped 18% in that period, and property-tax revenues fell 30% due to the real estate market crash.
Let’s talk population trends. Many readers are familiar with the arresting Golden State statistics cited by a Wall Street Journal article in March:
….read more…
The 21st Century `Exodus`
Wall Street Journal (h/t, Reggie Dunlop):
Nearly four million more people have left the Golden State in the last two decades than have come from other states. This is a sharp reversal from the 1980s, when 100,000 more Americans were settling in California each year than were leaving. According to Mr. Kotkin, most of those leaving are between the ages of 5 and 14 or 34 to 45. In other words, young families.
The scruffy-looking urban studies professor at Chapman University in Orange, Calif., has been studying and writing on demographic and geographic trends for 30 years. Part of California’s dysfunction, he says, stems from state and local government restrictions on development. These policies have artificially limited housing supply and put a premium on real estate in coastal regions.
“Basically, if you don’t own a piece of Facebook or Google and you haven’t robbed a bank and don’t have rich parents, then your chances of being able to buy a house or raise a family in the Bay Area or in most of coastal California is pretty weak,” says Mr. Kotkin.
While many middle-class families have moved inland, those regions don’t have the same allure or amenities as the coast. People might as well move to Nevada or Texas, where housing and everything else is cheaper and there’s no income tax.
And things will only get worse in the coming years as Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown and his green cadre implement their “smart growth” plans to cram the proletariat into high-density housing. “What I find reprehensible beyond belief is that the people pushing [high-density housing] themselves live in single-family homes and often drive very fancy cars, but want everyone else to live like my grandmother did in Brownsville in Brooklyn in the 1920s,” Mr. Kotkin declares.
“The new regime”—his name for progressive apparatchiks who run California’s government—”wants to destroy the essential reason why people move to California in order to protect their own lifestyles.”
Housing is merely one front of what he calls the “progressive war on the middle class.” Another is the cap-and-trade law AB32, which will raise the cost of energy and drive out manufacturing jobs without making even a dent in global carbon emissions. Then there are the renewable portfolio standards, which mandate that a third of the state’s energy come from renewable sources like wind and the sun by 2020. California’s electricity prices are already 50% higher than the national average.
Oh, and don’t forget the $100 billion bullet train. Mr. Kotkin calls the runaway-cost train “classic California.” “Where [Brown] with the state going bankrupt is even thinking about an expenditure like this is beyond comprehension. When the schools are falling apart, when the roads are falling apart, the bridges are unsafe, the state economy is in free fall. We’re still doing much worse than the rest of the country, we’ve got this growing permanent welfare class, and high-speed rail is going to solve this?”
Mr. Kotkin describes himself as an old-fashioned Truman Democrat. In fact, he voted for Mr. Brown—who previously served as governor, secretary of state and attorney general—because he believed Mr. Brown “was interesting and thought outside the box.”
But “Jerry’s been a big disappointment,” Mr. Kotkin says. “I’ve known Jerry for 35 years, and he’s smart, but he just can’t seem to be a paradigm breaker. And of course, it’s because he really believes in this green stuff.”
In the governor’s dreams, green jobs will replace all of the “tangible jobs” that the state’s losing in agriculture, manufacturing, warehousing and construction. But “green energy doesn’t create enough energy!” Mr. Kotkin exclaims. “And it drives up the price of energy, which then drives out other things.” Notwithstanding all of the subsidies the state lavishes on renewables, green jobs only make up about 2% of California’s private-sector work force—no more than they do in Texas.
[….]
Meanwhile, taxes are harming the private economy. According to the Tax Foundation, California has the 48th-worst business tax climate. Its income tax is steeply progressive. Millionaires pay a top rate of 10.3%, the third-highest in the country. But middle-class workers—those who earn more than $48,000—pay a top rate of 9.3%, which is higher than what millionaires pay in 47 states.
And Democrats want to raise taxes even more. Mind you, the November ballot initiative that Mr. Brown is spearheading would primarily hit those whom Democrats call “millionaires” (i.e., people who make more than $250,000 a year). Some Republicans have warned that it will cause a millionaire march out of the state, but Mr. Kotkin says that “people who are at the very high end of the food chain, they’re still going to be in Napa. They’re still going to be in Silicon Valley. They’re still going to be in West L.A.”
That said, “It’s really going to hit the small business owners and the young family that’s trying to accumulate enough to raise a family, maybe send their kids to private school. It’ll kick them in the teeth.”
A worker in Wichita might not consider those earning $250,000 a year middle class, but “if you’re a guy working for a Silicon Valley company and you’re married and you’re thinking about having your first kid, and your family makes 250-k a year, you can’t buy a closet in the Bay Area,” Mr. Kotkin says. “But for 250-k a year, you can live pretty damn well in Salt Lake City. And you might be able to send your kids to public schools and own a three-bedroom, four-bath house.”
According to Mr. Kotkin, these upwardly mobile families are fleeing in droves. As a result, California is turning into a two-and-a-half-class society. On top are the “entrenched incumbents” who inherited their wealth or came to California early and made their money. Then there’s a shrunken middle class of public employees and, miles below, a permanent welfare class. As it stands today, about 40% of Californians don’t pay any income tax and a quarter are on Medicaid.
It’s “a very scary political dynamic,” he says. “One day somebody’s going to put on the ballot, let’s take every penny over $100,000 a year, and you’ll get it through because there’s no real restraint. What you’ve done by exempting people from paying taxes is that they feel no responsibility. That’s certainly a big part of it.
And the welfare recipients, he emphasizes, “aren’t leaving. Why would they? They get much better benefits in California or New York than if they go to Texas. In Texas the expectation is that people work.”
California used to be more like Texas—a jobs magnet. What happened? For one, says the demographer, Californians are now voting more based on social issues and less on fiscal ones than they did when Ronald Reagan was governor 40 years ago. Environmentalists are also more powerful than they used to be. And Mr. Brown facilitated the public-union takeover of the statehouse by allowing state workers to collectively bargain during his first stint as governor in 1977.
Mr. Kotkin also notes that demographic changes are playing a role. As progressive policies drive out moderate and conservative members of the middle class, California’s politics become even more left-wing. It’s a classic case of natural selection, and increasingly the only ones fit to survive in California are the very rich and those who rely on government spending. In a nutshell, “the state is run for the very rich, the very poor, and the public employees.”
So if California’s no longer the Golden land of opportunity for middle-class dreamers, what is?
Mr. Kotkin lists four “growth corridors”: the Gulf Coast, the Great Plains, the Intermountain West, and the Southeast. All of these regions have lower costs of living, lower taxes, relatively relaxed regulatory environments, and critical natural resources such as oil and natural gas.
Take Salt Lake City. “Almost all of the major tech companies have moved stuff to Salt Lake City.” That includes Twitter, Adobe, eBay and Oracle.
Then there’s Texas, which is on a mission to steal California’s tech hegemony. Apple just announced that it’s building a $304 million campus and adding 3,600 jobs in Austin. Facebook established operations there last year, and eBay plans to add 1,000 new jobs there too.
Even Hollywood is doing more of its filming on the Gulf Coast. “New Orleans is supposedly going to pass New York as the second-largest film center. They have great incentives, and New Orleans is the best bargain for urban living in the United States. It’s got great food, great music, and it’s inexpensive.”
California Tax Revenue Plunges by 22% ~ Top 10 reasons Companies Are Leaving California
State Controller John Chaing continues to uphold the California Great Seal Motto of “Eureka”, i.e., ‘I have found it’. But what Chaing is finding as Controller is that California’s economy as measured by tax revenues is still tanking. Compared to last year, State tax collections for February shriveled by $1.2 billion or 22%. The deterioration is more than double the shocking $535 million reported decline for last month. The cumulative fiscal year decline is $6.1 billion or down 11% versus this period in 2011.
While California Governor Brown promises strong economic growth is just around the corner, Chaing proves that the best way for Sacramento politicians to hurt the economy and thereby generate lower tax revenue, is to have the highest tax rates in the nation.
California politicians seem delusional in their continued delusion that high taxes have not savaged the State’s economy. Each month’s disappointment is written off as due to some one-time event.
The State Controller’s office did acknowledge that higher than normal tax refunds for February might have reduced the collection of some personal income taxes. Given that 2012 has an extra day in February for leap year, there might have been one day more of tax refunds sent out. But the Controller’s report shows personal income tax collections fell by $325 million, or 16% versus last year. Furthermore, leap year would have added another day for retail sales and use tax collection, but those revenues also fell during February-by an even larger $813 million, 25% decline from 2011.
The more likely reason tax collections continue falling is that businesses and successful people are leaving California for the better tax rates available in more pro-business states.
Derisively referred to as “Taxifornia” by the independent Pacific Research Institute, California wins the booby prize for the highest personal income taxes in the nation and higher sales tax rates than all but four other states. Though Californians benefit from Proposition 13 restrictions on how much their property tax can increase in one year, the state still has the worst state tax burden in the U.S.
Spectrum Locations Consultants recorded 254 California companies moved some or all of their work and jobs out of state in 2011, 26% more than in 2010 and five times as many as in 2009. According SLC President, Joe Vranich: the “top ten reasons companies are leaving California: 1) Poor rankings in surveys 2) More adversarial toward business 3) Uncontrollable public spending 4) Unfriendly business climate 5) Provable savings elsewhere 6) Most expensive business locations 7) Unfriendly legal environment for business 8) Worst regulatory burden 9) Severe tax treatment 10) Unprecedented energy costs.
The California [Taxpayer Funded] Bullet Train vs. Private Business
West Coast Blog has this story about the final cost — so far — of the California boondoggle known as the Bullet Train:
Bullet Train From SF to LA Doesn’t Cost $33.6 Billion Anymore… Try $100 Billion!
Ok, so that headline may sound like Dr Evil from the Austin Powers movies. How many of you actually read it in the Dr Evil voice? But even though it wasn’t Dr Evil speaking the headline, it sure feels like he is controlling the budget for high-speed rail project in California.
The high-speed rail project was approved to build a bullet train, very similar to those in Europe and parts of Asia, to connect San Francisco and Los Angeles. It would cut the traveling time between the two cities from 5-6 hours (by car) down to 2 Hours 40 Minutes. When it was passed 3 years ago, the estimated cost was $33.6 Billion broken down as follows:
$15 Billion – Federal Government
$5 Billion – Local Government
$10 Billion – Private Investors
Remainder – California
But in the last 3 years, the California High-Speed Rail authority has had problems raising money from private investors. Surprise? Not only has the project had trouble finding investors, the estimated date of completion of 2020 has been pushed back to 2033. This delay in time has caused the majority of the cost increases and estimated costs are now expected at $100 Billion. FYI: the entire California state budget is only $86 Billion.
Take note the almost instantaneous ballooning effect of the total cost via government meddling, here is the L.A. Times giving the most recent total cost update:
As the price tag for California’s bullet train has soared to nearly $100 billion, a central argument for forging ahead with the controversial project is an even loftier figure: the $171 billion that promoters recently estimated will be needed for new roads and airports if no high-speed rail is built….
….The bullet train is aimed at meeting future transportation needs of the state….
Newsflash! People are leaving California, not coming to it!
Another L.A.Times story says this:
…When the first business plan surfaced, it projected a $34-billion cost. By 2009, the estimate had jumped to $43 billion, in part because the authority included future inflation in the estimated cost of building the system over the next decade.
In August, the authority released two planning documents that signaled even higher costs. The cost of building only the first two segments in the Central Valley had jumped in price by as much as 100%, not including future inflation…
And HotAir points out the death knell for this type of liberal thinking:
CA auditor warns bullet train project financing “increasingly risky”
Few people probably noticed the absence of “high-speed rail” from Barack Obama’s State of the Union speech last night. The issue took a prominent position in SOTU speeches in 2011, when Obama dedicated five paragraphs to pushing it, and in 2010, when Obama promoted the high-speed rail project in Florida that Governor Rick Scott killed. Last night’s mentions: zero.
Perhaps the White House didn’t have a good answer as to why their pet rail project in California has become so expensive and bloated that the state auditor issued a warning hours before the SOTU began about its financing becoming so “increasingly risky” that state lawmakers should consider whether to proceed (via Andrew Malcolm):
In the latest in a series of cautionary reports by outside agencies and groups, the auditor’s report finds that the California High-Speed Rail Authority has made some progress in addressing planning and fiscal concerns but still has important work to do to ensure that the project can be built as promised.
“The program’s overall financial situation has become increasingly risky, in part because the authority has not provided viable funding alternatives in the event its planned funding does not materialize,” the auditor’s report says.
The authority has secured $12.5 billion for the first leg — from Los Angeles to San Francisco — of what is planned to be an 80-mile network, according to the report says. But it notes the projected cost of that phase has risen to between $98.1 billion and $117.6 billion.
The auditor warns that the state has no clear way to raise the $105 billion in funding necessary to complete the project, but that’s just half of the problem:
“The success or failure of the program” depends on obtaining up to $105 billion in additional funding, which has not been identified, the report says. It also finds that cost estimates for the initial phase do not include operating or maintenance outlays, which the auditor estimates could total $97 billion between 2025 and 2060.
Smaller or Larger Government? Equality or Prosperity?
For context:
The following comes from a discussion elsewhere on the Web, and should serve as a great reminder to the deleterious effects of larger (more regulatory) government vs. a smaller form of it:
The main point is that one party has people in it that are for small government — people like Ron Paul, Larry Elder, and the late Milton Friedman (a libertarian “god” of sorts). In the other you have people who want to grow government larger, and larger, and larger. California is a microcosm of the effect this has on businesses and regulating people’s lives. However, this drive to regulate people and their lives and to grow government, has, in every case, increased the possibility of government intrusion by force into the lives of ordinary people, which increase the risk (again, this is provable in history) of detention and death.
Which is why most libertarians vote Republican, they want smaller government. A great example is the housing market crisis. Some people are under the impression this was caused due to an easing of regulation. Not true. In fact, it was government-regulating banks to loan to people it would previously not. Why is this? Because the left wants [material] equality, the right wants people to prosper. One offers the most freedom, the other forces one person to pay for another. Here is an a small sampling of 2012 regulations from California that is helping businesses make the choice in moving to other states:
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✦In addition to mandatory insurance coverage, eligible female employees can take four months pregnancy disability leave, under provisions of SB 299.
✦The independent contractor law, SB 459, is worth discussing with a legal or h/r expert, because the rules are so tough and potentially expensive. That $5,000 to $25,000 fine is PER INCIDENT.
✦Employees can take up to 30 business days in a year for donating organs or bone marrow. SB 272 clarifies the law a bit.
✦Company dress codes must accommodate transvestites and cross dressers under AB 887.
✦Companies operating in multiple states must offer the same insurance coverage for same-sec couples and domestic partners as they do married couples in California.
✦Five new laws change workers compensation insurance. Check with your insurance carrier.
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Everything the growth in government touches (which is typically from the left… or, the right embracing the foundational thinking of the left [like Bush working with Kennedy to increase the size and focus of the Dept of Education]). This regulation causes friction between government and regular people. As more and more regulations are added, the increase in the possibility of armed persons coming to your door increases — like this example of natural foods markets being raided: http://biggovernment.com/
So persons that *REALLY* want to effect the political spectrum and possibly decrease the size of the government the most would want to vote Republican (like Milton Friedman, Larry Elder, and Rand Paul [Ron Paul’s son]). And this decreases the abrasive aspect of government and the regular Joe meeting. Congress — for instance – should meet for 3-months during the year, and do less of this:
“Federal agencies publish an average of over 200 pages of new rulings, regulations, and proposals in the Federal Register each business day. That growth of the federal statute book is one of the clearest measures of the increase of the government control of the citizenry…” James Bovard, Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty (St. Martins Griffen; 1994), 1.
“All forms of the liberal agenda interfere with the rational relationship between human action and the conditions of life by disconnecting outcomes from adaptive behavior. Government welfare programs of all kinds disconnect the receipt of material benefits from productive behavior and voluntary exchange, and from those normal developmental processes that lead to adult competence. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and all other federal and state welfare programs divorce an individual’s material security and emotional well being from his economic and social connections to his community, and replace them with a marriage to government officials. In particular, welfare programs disconnect the individual’s security and well being from two of his most reliable resources: his own initiative in producing and exchanging with others, and his social bonds to members of his family, church, neighborhood or village. The liberal agenda’s takeover of countless individual and community functions, from early education to care of the elderly, has had the effect of alienating the individual from his community and robbing both of their essential mutuality. In the economic sphere, especially, the liberal agenda’s rules have become strikingly irrational. Countless restrictions dictate what the ordinary businessman and professional may or may not do regarding hiring procedures, sales and purchasing, health insurance plans, retirement plans, safety precautions, transportation policies, racial and ethnic quotas, immigration matters, liability rules, and provisions for the handicapped. Endless paperwork adds to the already crushing burden of confiscatory taxation. Licensure requirements needlessly prevent workers from entering new fields in which they are willing to work hard and risk much in order to make life better for themselves and their families. Unnecessary and unjust restrictions in the freedom with which individuals can run their economic lives are the hallmarks of the liberal agenda. But the social pathology of collectivism extends well beyond the economic realm. While children can be happy in dependent relationships with parents, adults cannot be happy in any mature sense in dependent relationships with government welfare programs, no matter how well intentioned or administered. The reasons for this are developed more thoroughly below and occupy a major portion of this book. Stated briefly, however, the large-scale dependency of the adult citizen on governments is always inherently pathological and always profoundly detrimental to…” Lyle H. Rossiter, The Liberal Mind: The Psychological Causes of Political Madness, p. 71.
Cal Watchdog adds to the idea with the most recent businesses leaving:
Waste Connections, a Folsom-based garbage hauling and landfill company, said last week it is busting a move for Texas. Santa Barbara-based Superconductor Technologies Inc., which develops advanced superconducting wire, also confirmed this week it is leaving for the Lone Star State.
After California’s ongoing budget imbroglio, there is arguably no greater crisis facing our once Golden State than the continuing exodus of homegrown companies like Waste Connections and Superconductor Technologies. Yet, lawmakers in Sacramento are doing next to nothing about it.
In fact, Waste Connections CEO Ron Mittlestaedt actually warned state officials back in August that his company was thinking about relocating to another state. Those officials failed to step up and dissuade the Sacramento region’s largest publicly traded company from leaving.
Higher TaxesMittlestaedt echoed the lament of all too many California CEO’s that the state is inhospitable for business. It “has the highest tax rates in the nation,” he told the Sacramento Bee this week, “and they’re going higher.” And California is not only fiscally broke, he said, but also “structurally.”
By that, he was referring to the state’s hostile regulatory environment. As when the Legislature this year neglected to pass a measure that would have made it easier for Waste Connections and other landfill operators to move trash around the state, while doing no harm to the environment.
Superconductor Technologies CEO Jeff Quiram said in a statement that the company’s goal of becoming “a leader in the superconducting wire industry recently reached the inflection point where it was time to make a move.”
Translation: The cost, the hassle of doing business in California has risen to such a level that aspiring companies like STI cannot grow their businesses the way they can in competing states….
Other posts referencing these issue worth checking out: