03/28/2024

News

Beyond the Wall of Debt: Detailing California’s Debt and Unfunded Liabilities

California state and local governments face more than $443 billion in outstanding liabilities from borrowing, deferrals, and other unfunded financial obligations.

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Best States for Doing Business in 2013

Virginia and North Dakota top the list of the best states to do business in 2013, according to Forbes’ annual study. At the bottom is Maine, which has been at No. 50 for four straight years. California is ranked No. 39. The best ranked states tend to have a wealth of incentives for companies and also economies that are recovering more robustly from the Great Recession. Now in its eighth year, the annual ranking takes into account factors such as labor, supply costs, the regulatory environment and growth prospects.

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BLS Unemployment Rate: What Texas Can Teach the Nation

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistic’s (BLS) August state employment report released last Friday, Texas’ entrepreneurs added more jobs over the last year than any other state in the nation. To further solidify the state’s job creation success, Texas’ unemployment rate has now been lower than the national average, and California’s, for 80 consecutive months — longer than President Obama has been in office (see below).

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Chamber of Commerce Successful Against Most “Job Killer” Bills

“The giant lobbying group, which represents 13,500 large and small employers, posted a near-perfect score in efforts this year to defeat legislation it labeled “job killers.”

This year, the chamber went gunning for 38 such bills. Only one made it through both the Democratic Party-dominated Legislature and landed on the governor’s desk.”

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Top States for Doing Business 2013: Site Consultant Survey Results

As the economy improves and states continue to vie for new investment and jobs, they also seek the attention of site consultants who help companies make their new facility and expansion decisions. With that in mind, Area Development’s fourth annual Top States for Doing Business survey of site consultants ranks the states based on their number of mentions in 17 categories (scores were weighted based on position in each category and then overall).

Research & Studies
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California Set to Raise State Minimum Raise

Workers in California would be paid at least $10 an hour in 2016 under a bill passed by the legislature Thursday, a measure likely to make the state the first to guarantee such a high minimum wage.

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Dan Walters: Unions Held Whip Hand in California Capitol

Dozens of measures that unions wanted to enhance their members’ incomes, fringe benefits, bargaining positions and procedural rights were enacted, albeit not always as extensively as they wished. Just as consistently, legislation that unions opposed fell by the wayside, even when it had broad public support, or even when Gov. Jerry Brown, their on-again, off-again ally, wanted it. An overhaul of the California Environmental Quality Act was the most conspicuous example.

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California Lawmakers Back Bill that would Lower Energy Prices

California lawmakers took a major step Thursday toward lowering the state’s high electricity prices—and set the stage for a big battle over incentives that have turned the state into the biggest market for residential-rooftop solar power. A bill passed by the legislature Thursday repeals a 2001 law, meant to encourage conservation, which requires the state’s investor-owned utilities to sell power at rates that rise sharply the more electricity a customer uses. The new legislation doesn’t say how prices should be set in the future, leaving that to regulators, utilities and public advocates to work out.

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CEQA Changes Narrowed, Broader Effort Delayed (Again)

Democratic Senate Leader Darrell Steinberg is shelving most of his effort to streamline the California Environmental Quality Act, or CEQA, this year. The decision came late Wednesday night at the end of the second-to-last day of legislative session.

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State and Local Sales Tax Rates Midyear 2013

The five states with the highest average combined rates are Tennessee (9.44 percent), Arkansas (9.18 percent), Louisiana (8.89 percent), Washington (8.87 percent), and Oklahoma (8.72 percent). . . California, which raised its sales and income taxes through the initiative process in November of 2012, has the highest state-level rate at 7.5 percent.] Five states tie for the second-highest statewide rate with 7 percent each: Indiana, Mississippi, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Tennessee.

Research & Studies
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Progress Report: Film and Television Tax Credit Program & Competition for California’s Entertainment Industry

The California Film & Television Tax Credit Program (Program) was enacted in February 2009 as part of a targeted economic stimulus package to increase film and television production spending, jobs and tax revenues in California. The Program has just commenced its 5th fiscal year. This report will summarize the Program’s progress from its launch in July 2009 through June 2013, and includes spending estimates and project information for the current fiscal year (July 2013 – June 2014). The report also includes a brief overview of California’s entertainment industry and the growing competition for our state’s motion picture production spending, as well as supplementary background on the changing landscape for scripted television series production.

Research & Studies
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The US as One of the Developed World’s Lowest-Cost Manufacturers

We project that the U.S., as a result of its increasing competitiveness in manufacturing, will capture $70 billion to $115 billion in annual exports from other nations by the end of the decade. About two-thirds of these export gains could come from production shifts to the U.S. from leading European nations and Japan. By 2020, higher U.S. exports, combined with production work that will likely be “reshored” from China, could create 2.5 million to 5 million American factory and service jobs associated with increased manufacturing.

Research & Studies
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Dan Walters: Once Again, Cronyism Rears Head in California

Over time, however, complying with CEQA became not only a torturous slog through very expensive red tape – one that elevated complex process over final product – but a tool for interest groups to engage in what can only be described as extortion. Do something for us, they could and sometimes would implicitly threaten, or we’ll tie up your project in court for years or even decades and it will die an expensive, lingering death. Many payoff demands have absolutely nothing to do with environmental protection.

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Top Trends in State Economic Development

Governors have updated their economic development strategies and launched new initiatives to further spur economic growth and provide high wage jobs, according to a report released by the National Governors Association (NGA).

Research & Studies
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Editorial: Legislature Should Fix CEQA, and Stop Cutting Special Deals

If Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg wants to do an end run around the California Environmental Quality Act to expedite the proposed new arena in downtown Sacramento, why shouldn’t those changes apply statewide to similar urban projects?

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