News

Forty-six years after Mercedes-Benz planted roots in Southern California, the luxury automaker is establishing its next phase of growth in Long Beach.

In a new step to expose hidden debt, the Governmental Accounting Standards Board last week proposed that retiree health care debt or “unfunded liability” be reported on the face of government financial statements, not buried inside.

In addition to the standard base rate of 1 percent of assessed value of a property, owners pay more than 20 other items listed on their tax bills. One, misleadingly labeled “City of Richmond,” is actually a levy solely to help fund the retirement plans for workers and retirees.

Workers can recover unpaid wages by placing liens on property owned by their employers, including businesses and homes where they performed work, under a bill that passed the Assembly on Wednesday.

The California Senate on Wednesday could not muster the votes to pass a measure that would have penalized high chief executive salaries with higher corporate taxes.

Legislators moved Thursday to further hike the state’s minimum wage and to guarantee workers three paid sick days a year, despite opposition from the California Chamber of Commerce, which labeled both proposals “job killers.”

Demand for the state’s first round of business tax credits under the new California Competes program far exceeds supply, with applications totaling $559 million for only $30 million in credits available this year.

One of the core barriers to economic prosperity in California is the price of housing. But it doesn’t have to be this way. Policies designed to stifle the ability to develop land are based on flawed premises. These policies prevail because they are backed by environmentalists, and, most importantly, because they have played into the agenda of crony capitalists, Wall Street financiers, and public sector unions. But while the elites have benefit, ordinary working families have been condemned to pay extreme prices in mortgages, property taxes, or rents, to live in confined, unhealthy, ultra high-density neighborhoods. . . Earlier this month an economist writing for the American Enterprise Institute, Mark J. Perry, published a chart proving that over the past four years, more new homes were built in one city, Houston Texas, than in the entire state of California.

In addition to getting rid of outdated laws, the project made taxes simpler, cut bureaucratic red tape, speeded up business permits and required state agencies to communicate in plain language.

This report categorizes and provides information about $340 billion in California’s key retirement, infrastructure, and budgetary liabilities. In addition, this report provides a framework for the Legislature to consider in prioritizing repayment of these liabilities and makes recommendations on which liabilities to pay down first and how the state could address such costs in the future.

Gov. Jerry Brown’s administration is rolling out a new $750-million program that offers some modest financial incentives to encourage California employers to stay put and help persuade out-of-state companies to move here.

As news came in Thursday that tax receipts have come in more than $2 billion above revenue projections made by the Brown administration in January, legislative leaders struck a deal on the governor’s rainy day fund plan.

Electricity bills are rising for small businesses as well as commercial and industrial utility customers, as San Diego Gas & Electric shifts the way it pays for low-income subsidies. Residential customers, meanwhile, will save.

What’s happening on the red carpet mirrors what’s happening on film sets and TV soundstages. New York had a record number of film and TV projects last year and is on track to do the same in 2014, state officials say. Credit goes to generous financial incentives, experienced crews that rival Hollywood’s best and friendly (some might say star-struck) politicians.

A CalPERS report intended for policymakers, noting that a reform cuts $435 a month from the pensions of many new hires, suggests that a pay raise may be needed to “compete for quality employees.”