In just four years Gavin Newsom has increased State spending by 64%. Imagines what he could do for America? Biden adding $6 trillion to the national deficit in three years will seem meager.
“California’s Democrat super-majority Legislature and governor are moving full-steam ahead with reparations for black descendants of slaves, high speed rail, and have increased spending a staggering 64% since Gavin Newsom was elected in 2019. But not on anything to make lives better for people – Democrats continually choose power over the people, treating taxpayers as a cash cow.
With 16 new laws starting January 1st “that cover everything from campsite reservations to child sex trafficking,” there is no tax relief, or crime relief, or relief from the homeless living on our streets, or relief from the criminals being let out of prison, or for that matter, no relief from the state’s out-of-touch politicians.”
Trump does not need to campaign. All he has to do is point to California and remind folks this is what the Democrats want to do to America.
Reparations, Bullet Train, 64% State Spending Increase: California’s Democrats Choose Power Over the People
We have no relief from the state’s out-of-touch politicians
By Katy Grimes, California Globe, 12/26/23 https://californiaglobe.com/fl/reparations-bullet-train-64-state-spending-increase-californias-democrats-choose-power-over-the-people/
California’s Democrat super-majority Legislature and governor are moving full-steam ahead with reparations for black descendants of slaves, high speed rail, and have increased spending a staggering 64% since Gavin Newsom was elected in 2019. But not on anything to make lives better for people – Democrats continually choose power over the people, treating taxpayers as a cash cow.
With 16 new laws starting January 1st “that cover everything from campsite reservations to child sex trafficking,” there is no tax relief, or crime relief, or relief from the homeless living on our streets, or relief from the criminals being let out of prison, or for that matter, no relief from the state’s out-of-touch politicians.
While California has plenty of very serious issues that need to be addressed by its elected lawmakers, the legislature and governor appear to have a very different agenda, and are not the least bit interested in correcting their own bad policies.
If it appears politicians don’t care about the people they convinced to elect them, you’d be right – because so many are wholly owned subsidiaries of their funders. Once they receive your vote, it’s on to their real agenda – for big labor unions, the environmental lobby, and myriad other well-funded special interest groups.
And that brings us to the crisis that is California.
We start with California’s $68 billion budget deficit – which notably does not include the state’s more than $1 trillion unfunded pension and health care liability for its retired government employees, or the massive debt California owes to the federal government for the EDD unemployment fraud during the COVID pandemic.
Could a California revenue shortfall mean furloughs for state employees? California went from a $100 Billion budget “surplus” to “we may need to layoff state workers.”
“General Fund Expenditures Per Capita have climbed 63.9% since Governor Newsom took office, growing at more than twice the annual rate at which those expenditures grew under Governor Brown (10.4% vs. 4.7%)” state finance expert David Crane reported at his Govern For California website.
“Of course, Mr. Newsom didn’t approve all that spending on his own,” Crane continued. “He was joined by a State Legislature led by former Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon and Senate President Pro-Tem Toni Atkins. Robert Rivas is the new Speaker and Mike McGuire will soon be the new Pro-Tem. Time will tell if they and Mr. Newsom are interested in spending reforms. They should be, not only because California is the rare state to forecast deficits despite economic growth but also because their General and Special Funds spent $1.3 trillion over the past five years yet residents would be hard-pressed to say how public services have improved and elected officials would be just as hard-pressed to account for the performance of those expenditures.”
As the Globe recently reported, when Governor Jerry Brown was elected in 2011, the state budget was $98 billion and the state’s population was a little over 38 million people. Brown doubled the budget up to $199.3 billion – with no measurable increase in population. Gov. Newsom inherited Brown’s $199.3 billion budget, and has grown it to $330 billion in 5 years – while losing population.
Where is all of that new spending going, and why are we still being gouged with high taxes?
New taxes are being imposed on January 1, 2024 to cover Newsom’s and Democrats’ deficit spending.
Across the state, cities are developing plans to electrify every building, creating all-electric cities to support the State’s goal of carbon neutrality by 2045.
This is not the goal of the people, any more than the people are demanding electric cars – they are not, and car dealers are stuck with lots full of unsold electric cars. GM is buying out Buick dealers who don’t want to sell electric cars, and Ford is also getting pushback from dealers.
Commensurately, in November, the California Utilities Commission granted Pacific Gas and Electric a 13% rate hike – ostensibly to pay for under grounding power lines.
Because Gov. Gavin Newsom appoints the commissioners to the CPUC, this is “Gavinomics.” Expect the other utilities to hike rates as well.
Residential electricity prices in California are already more than twice the national average.
Fast Food CEOs Warn Of Dire Consequences Coming over New $20 Fast Food Minimum Wage – we warned – expect to see fast food workers replaced by robots and kiosks. The new $20 an hour fast food minimum wage law set to begin in April 2024 was blasted by several fast food company leaders, who warned of huge consequences ahead, ranging from higher prices to possible location closures.
California’s high poverty rate is thanks to bad policies – Lawmakers recently voted to place on your ballots a measure to make it easier for local governments to raise taxes, and have further placed a measure to make it harder to prevent tax increases. Those were ACA 1 and ACA 13.
Higher taxes continue to discourage businesses from expanding or investing in California, which ultimately hurts working Californians.
Highest-in-the-nation gas prices also hurt families, small, medium and large business owners, and all working Californians. The national average today for a gallon of gas is $3.126 – California’s average price for a gallon of gas is coming in at $4.620, with the high at $5.755.
States tax fuel in several ways, including sales taxes, per-gallon excise taxes collected at the pump, taxes imposed on wholesalers (which are passed along to consumers in the form of higher prices), and a variety of operational taxes, such as underground storage tank fees, that are often charged to the retailer.
We add up all these different taxes and fees (not including carbon fees) to calculate a total tax rate on gas for each state.
As the Globe reported last week, California’s overall tax burden on middle– and lower-income folks is higher than nearly all other states.
The Tax Foundation compares all 50 states on over 40 measures of tax rates, collections, burdens, and more, and reports in its State Tax Collections per Capita, California is number #2, and in its State Individual Income Tax Collections per Capita, California is number #1. They also note that Florida and Texas have no individual income tax, along with Washington state, South Dakota, Wyoming, Tennessee, New Hampshire and Alaska – despite Gov. Newsom claiming otherwise.
California is a mess under the policies, edicts, executive orders and hiring decisions of Gov. Gavin Newsom and the Democrat Supermajority. Are the voters paying attention? Will they continue to support these disastrous policies and the politicians behind them?
Heading into 2024 is looking like it may be a real fight for the soul of the country, and the survival of California. How much worse does the state have to get before the people will act?
