Its official poverty rate was roughly in line with the nation as a whole, but the Census Bureau’s alternative measure, which took into account all forms of income and the cost of living, found nearly a quarter of Californians to be impoverished, by far the highest rate of any state.
About $467 million of the $560 million increase covers raises already scheduled for many union-covered employees, exempt state managers and supervisors, said Nick Schroeder, who tracks state employee costs for the Legislative Analyst’s Office. The balance would go to medical-benefit cost hikes and other anticipated employee-expense increases.
Gov. Jerry Brown unveiled a spending plan Friday that restores few recession-era spending cuts to social services, with schools and a voter-approved rainy day reserve benefiting the most from robust revenue growth in recent months.
California income and corporation tax collections surged in December, pushing estimated tax revenue since July to about $3.6 billion above what lawmakers projected when they approved the current budget, according to preliminary totals compiled by the nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office.
With his first bill as a state senator, former Assembly Speaker Bob Hertzberg has proposed a massive shift in California tax policy, one he says better reflects a 21st century economy where information and services make up a huge portion of economic activity. The Los Angeles Democrat proposes extending the state’s sales tax to many services and devoting the money to education and local governments. As a tax hike, the bill requires two-thirds approval – a heavy lift in a Legislature where Democrats have lost their supermajority. But Hertzberg chairs the committee that oversees tax bills and is widely seen as an ambitious politician. Taxes will also figure big this year as political operatives prepare ballot measures for the 2016 election. Education advocates are calling for an extension of the temporary tax increases voters approved with Proposition 30 in 2012, and liberal activists want to change 1978’s Proposition 13 to increase taxes on commercial property. Public health advocates have said they will pursue a new tax on cigarettes this year, through either legislation or the ballot box.
The danger in focusing on the most superficial indices of economic health, such as the official unemployment rate, is that politicians will pat themselves on the back and not take the steps, such as regulatory reform, that would be needed for broader, sustainable recovery.
Once again, the two agencies are disagreeing over the extent of outmigration from California to other states, but this time, the Census Bureau is seeing less movement than the state’s demographers. “Domestic migration is the big cause,” says state demographer John Malson.
One of those occasions was last August, when both legislative houses, without a single dissenting vote, passed Senate Bill 850, which – on a limited, pilot basis – grants some community college districts the authority to offer four-year bachelor’s degree programs.
California added 90,100 payroll jobs in November as the state’s unemployment rate dipped slightly, to 7.2 percent.
The California Climate Leadership Forum, starting at 1 p.m. at the Kaiser Center, will focus on the state’s climate policy and its impact on local communities, as well as new approaches to addressing climate change. State Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de León and Assembly Speaker Toni Atkins will deliver keynote addresses, as will Steyer, a big political player who spent $30 million in 2012 to help pass an energy conservation measure, Proposition 39.
Thursday’s report by the state Department of Finance found that natural increase – the difference between live births and deaths – added 243,000 California residents. The other 92,000 came from net migration to the state, the report shows. More California residents are leaving the state than moving in from other states, but immigration from other countries more than offsets that.
The much higher voter turnout of a presidential election, coupled with a much lower threshold for qualifying initiative ballot measures, creates the opportunity for pro-tax-increase forces – such as public employee unions – to make their big move.
Small business owners are often left in the dark about the energy cost increases from environmental and climate change mandates. Latino-owned businesses are disproportionately impacted because many operate on a smaller profit margin, many don’t have as much access to financing and many businesses are less established. For minority-owned or family businesses, absorbing new environmental costs could mean being forced to reduce hours or lay off workers.
California’s general fund will take in $2 billion more in revenue through June than lawmakers expected when they approved the current budget plan, the Legislature’s nonpartisan fiscal analyst said Wednesday, yet all of the increase will be absorbed by the state’s voter-approved constitutional school-funding guarantee.
Those unfunded liabilities – in effect, long-term debts – will haunt state and local governments for decades as other forms of public spending are squeezed to cover the immense pension gap, even if those in charge are loath to admit it.