Earlier this month, Gov. Jerry Brown’s top aide, Nancy McFadden, when asked about the administration’s on-the-record opposition to efforts to raise the minimum wage, pointed out that a $15 minimum wage comes with a multi-billion price tag for state government.
This tax proposal, like all of them, creates winners and losers and would hurt certain industries disproportionately. Developers, for example, who buy, sell and develop multi-million dollar properties would be hard-hit by this new tax, and I would imagine they’d have some serious objections to it. Warehouse owners would also be hard hit, as would any business that involves a large real-estate footprint in California. Retailers, manufacturers and restauranteurs could all be negatively impacted.
With the trends moving in opposite directions, Texas now has a larger share of its workforce in government jobs than California. With a civilian workforce of just over 13 million, about 14.3% of all working Texans have government jobs.
While there are national and global pressures on manufacturing, they are acute in California. We have cutting-edge safety and environmental regulations, high costs of living, and a large underclass that does not have the training to serve the demands that manufacturing requires.