A report out Wednesday by sociologists at the University of Southern California asserts that San Diego’s economic growth will depend mightily on reducing income inequality, racial disparities and other examples of inequity.
Racial and economic inequality may be key issues facing America today, but the steps often pushed by progressives, including minority politicians, seem more likely to exacerbate these divisions than repair them. In a broad arc of policies affecting everything from housing to employment, the agenda being adopted serves to stunt upward mobility, self-sufficiency and property ownership.
When the Census Bureau began calculating poverty a half-century ago – as a “war on poverty” became a hot issue in Washington – it devised a rather simple formula. The formula defined income that would be counted – excluding non-cash income such as food stamps and housing subsidies – and applied it to a narrow “market basket” of food and other living necessities.
The extent of income inequality in any region such as the Bay Area is a result of local, state and national policies, and is exacerbated by economic factors such as technological progress and globalization. And, while local policies alone are largely inadequate to address the issue of extreme inequality, there are a variety of options that can ameliorate the effects. This report includes data on Bay Area income inequality, comparisons to the state and nation, a discussion of the root causes of inequality, and a set of local policy options.
About 15 million Hispanics lived in California on July 1, 2014, compared to roughly 14.9 million non-Hispanic whites, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates released late last week. The California Department of Finance predicted in 2013 that Hispanics would outnumber whites in 2014; the census figures confirm that prediction.
Key reasons include high-tech earners in Silicon Valley and the growing decline of middle-income households throughout the Bay Area.
Data from the trade consulting group Trade Partnership Worldwide illustrates how the congressional districts with the highest value of exports in 2013 (excluding oil and gas shipments) were places where the number of households earning more than $100,000 a year and the number of college graduates were above the national average–often far above. (See the complete chart.)
Federal Reserve policies launched in a historic economic slump may have exacerbated wealth disparities in the U.S., according to new research from the Philadelphia Fed.
The decision late last week by the State Water Resources Control Board upends a delicate compromise made weeks ago by environmental regulators, farmers and others as California struggles to cope with the fourth year of drought. For the next 10 days, water releases from Shasta will be lower than expected.
The nature of employment seems to be undergoing radical change. Among the trends weakening the traditional model of steady, full-time employment are on-demand work platforms like Lyft and Instacart; software to help companies schedule employees’ shifts almost in real time; and a desire among many workers for greater flexibility.
Roughly one in five black adults works for the government, teaching school, delivering mail, driving buses, processing criminal justice and managing large staffs. They are about 30 percent more likely to have a public sector job than non-Hispanic whites, and twice as likely as Hispanics.
The DOF projects that the the state will grow from 37.3 million residents in 2010 to 51.7 million in 2060. This is a 0.7 percent annual growth rate over the next 50 years. By contrast, California’s growth rate was 1.7 percent annually over the last 50 years (1960-2010), and a much higher 3.0 percent in the growth heyday of 1940 to 1990. However, even with this slower rate, California is expected to grow slightly more quickly than the nation (0.6 percent annually).
It found an “economic tale of two regions.” In Los Angeles, the base of private, non-farm jobs shrank between 1990 and 2013 before growing slightly last year, and came nowhere close to keeping up with population growth. In the Bay Area, growth rates in those jobs topped 20 percent.
“Sacramento’s economic recovery, slow to emerge, is in full bloom. Unemployment is down, and job growth is catching up to the rest of California. . . Still, thousands of Sacramentans struggle. They can’t find work, or have made do with part-time jobs or work that doesn’t pay as well as their old jobs. For every job opening in electrical engineering, there are 10 times as many jobs available for cashiers. “
As a recent report from the Brookings Institution reveals, income disparities are widest in the nation’s bluest – most liberal – cities and much narrower elsewhere. . . Blue-city politicians claim to help the poor with increases in minimum wages, but the burden of paying them mostly hits small employers, rather than the 5-percenters, and thus may eliminate jobs.