California on 'Verge of System Failure'
 

More news everyone!! Important!

http://www.moneynews.com/StreetTalk/...mo_code=A1D6-1

Think of it as Greece on the Pacific: A place with beautiful scenery where the government spent so far beyond its means that mass layoffs, welfare reductions that leave a million children and the poor and elderly without needed services and failing infrastructure are now the norm.

California?s fiscal hole reportedly is now so large that the state would have to free 168,000 prison inmates and permanently close 240 university and community college campuses to balance its budget in the fiscal year that begins July 1.

?We are on the verge of system failure,? Jean Ross, executive director of the California Budget Project, told the Globe and Mail.

?We have to get some federal money,? Ross says. ?It would be bad for the U.S. and, arguably, bad for the world to do the shock-therapy approach.?

Peter Dreier, a professor of politics at Occidental College, calls this a classic American dilemma.

?Americans expect a lot of their government,? Dreier says. ?But politicians have convinced them they?re not getting what they want.?

Budget analysts say Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has no choice but to ask Washington for bailout funds, and that Washington has no choice but to agree because not bailing out the Golden State could put the entire U.S. economy at risk.

It seems that California ? which at one time had the third-largest economy in the world ? is like the biggest U.S. banks: Too big to fail.

Neither Democrat Jerry Brown nor Republican Meg Whitman has offered details in their campaigns to become the state?s next governor about how to close this year?s $19 billion budget deficit or handle next year?s anticipated $37 billion deficit, the Mercury News reports.

maybe some of the high paid actors and directors should give up there hefty paychecks for there shitty movies..like avatar :2 cents:

OMG you mean they'd have to shrink the size of the government?!?!?! Oh the horrors!!!

Has anyone noticed that shrinking the government is never an option? It's only, get more money, get more money, get more money... it'll be catastrophic if we don't get more money! We HAVE to have more money...

A sure sign the government has its fingers in too many pies when it requires so much money to sustain itself...

As far as releasing 168,000 inmates, well no fucking shit! I bet the 168k that they release were probably in there for smoking pot, stealing news papers from news paper dispensers, and public drunkeness, knowing how the stupid three strikes law works.

Hey I have a grand idea guys, lets spend untold amounts of money on filling up our prisons with people who aren't criminals!

This is just another added reason we will be in the next depression soon enough :(

+1

Yep. And they will eventually, because we're out of options. Oakland is talking of laying off 200 police. Antioch wants to follow Vallejo and file bankruptcy as a city. LA has talked of shutting down the city 3 days a week. And I hear now of the DMV shutting down to 1 or 2 days a week. We are simply out of money.

MJ Legalization is on the table in November. I guess we'll see if anyone is serious about fixing the money hole or not.

Personally I don't think that they have the ability, or the will, to think in realistic economic terms.

I predict that California will vote to raise taxes on the highest earners in the state, both personal and corporate. This will cause those high earners to start to flee the state, taking their money, and the businesses, and jobs that they create, with them, and what will end up happening is that the lawmakers will actually succeed in LOWERING the states revenues.


You read it here first.



.

When someone and their millions of friends are hurling 50 gallon barrels of burning garbage through government or bank windows, THEN (and only then), will I "think of it as Greece on the Pacific".

Until then, I'll choose NOT to be scared by people paid to write articles for money magazines, and I'll think of the latest California financial crisis as: the latest California financial crisis.

:2 cents:

California is already one of the most expensive places to run a business. Annual corporate filing fee is $800.

Fuck California. Let it go under.

Exactly my point.... Now watch it get even worse.


.:2 cents:

i heard Obama is going to "n1gger rig" california, so no worries my left coast friends... :thumbsup





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Completely off topic :

Asheville, NC is some really sweet place.

Been there once in my life time and fucking sweet!

That's what I call a town man.......sweet.

Congrats that you live there!

California and Arizona are going to do a big trade.

California gets the Mexicans. Arizona gets the businesses.

You heard it here first!

Only if we get to keep Arizona's taxes.

Just sad really :(

I'm lost a bit on this one. What is the business that Arizona will get?
( not arguing here, just asking to be informed )

Lets see i am a out of state property owner.
1. CA now is taking 7% of rental properties (even though house is massibe loss)
2. My property taxes went up 350 a month on top of what they already are.

Seriously how much more can this shit go up?

I think we passed that exit awhile ago ...

The theory is that if California raises taxes more those with money (businesses) would move their businesses to other states with a more friendly tax environment. Arizona has a pretty friendly tax environment and is close by. Although it could be Nevada, Utah, Idaho, Mexico, China. Just making a funny on the two issues both states are having.

California doesnt put people in jail for smoking pot, it was decriminalized in 1976.

California on 'Verge of System Failure'?


Sorry, but I saw this one coming quite a while ago.

I bet 25% of those prisoners are from Stockton

$800?!?!

My state is $35 if you pay online, $40 if you don't.

Wasn't that the other night during the Lakers victory "street parties"?

Yeah, I think Hawaii is $25.

Problem isn't with the recent Governors its the fucking liberal big government legislature that they keep voting for the last 30 years that has caused the state to go in the shit hole.

If my fellow California residents would get a fucking clue and toss there ass out we might have a chance in hell in fixing it.

They'd move to Vegas first - no state taxes.

It's wonderful.

Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa?!?!??!?

You mean a Republican can't fix the shit in 8 years?!?!?!?!?
:winkwink:

For the past year or two State employees have been forced to take 3 unpaid days off every month. It is my understanding that this is being challenged in court and the courts move slowly...but the Governor said that if he is Governor and he loses in court that he will simply begin laying off State employees to compensate...but layoffs/reduction in pay...may happen anyhow...even with the future Governor.

BTW...this affects Pathfinder's oldest daughter as she has a Masters Degree and is a State Health Official.

Your state? I take it that you no longer live in Southern California?

Wait what all the socialist/communist/progressive actors are not getting together and pooling their money to save the state?

Yeah, I can see that in a way but where will Arizona get the labor from after
kicking out the illegals? They still need labor no matter what the tax break is.

Don't count on a lot of LA born folks to trek to Arizona; that's like a desparate act
to a LA born.

Why should they? I never see a band of rich republicans pooling their wealth to help anyone.

Not only that, but the first thing they start cutting is police, schools, fire, rescue etc. The things that are most vital to the most people. I'm sure there is a ton of at in the bloated California bureaucracy that can be trimmed before they start doing other things, but they don't do it that way because this makes it look more desperate so when they ask for more money people are more likely to vote for giving it to them.

Here in Oregon several years ago we voted on a measure that put a cap on the percentage of your property value they could charge you in property taxes. The leadership shit their pants and warned how this would cause school closures and police layoffs and all kinds of insanity. Magically a few years later instead of percentage going up, everyone's property value went up. I guess they figured if they can't take it one way they will take it another. Never once, when they were talking about laying off teachers, did they consider getting rid of even one of the over 200 school administrators who work part time at best yet make 6 figure salaries.

Because on ideology believes in spreading the wealth and the other believes in personal responsibility?

atually, in the socal neighborhoods where i live and operate, the 1st things they cut are maintenance and park hours. there's a tremendous amount of roadway signage blocked by overgrown greenery. a couple of the parks i frequent have trash bins overflowing, the gates are not opened when they should, etc.

So are you saying that if they did pool together and "spread the wealth" to "save" California that it would work? Your position is unclear. You want them to "spread their wealth" to save Cali, so you must be convinced of its possible success, but you don't want the repubs to have to contribute... Or,.... you just want to see more people piss away more money for no good reason.

Yes? No? :costumed87

why not raise taxes?

Of course I dont believe it would work. But I do not subscribe to the spread the wealth philosophy

Laffer Curve. Cali is tapped out.

Liberal policies like what Obama wants for the nation has put us here
California taxes the crap out of the rich and business's, so they move away, I'm getting my LLC from Nevada
One county, San Bernardino, spent 67 million on anchor babies in welfare
We have safe havens for illegal aliens and cities, instead of dealing with this, they boycott Arizona
I don't want pot legalized, for some reason I just don't see regulation of my pot by the government as a good thing, too easy to get a script

Republicans believe in full personal responsibility ................

except for corporations and military. For that, they believe in limited responsibility.

And of course they only believe in full personal responsibility until they get caught doing something wrong.


My all time favorite is Rush Limbaugh railing against drug users and saying how people who get caught doing something illegal should just own up to it, admit their mistake and face the consequences. Until he gets busted for having his maid try to buy him 5,000 Oxy pills then he shut up, got a lawyer and got himself the best deal possible. I guess so much for taking your punishment.

Solution is simple:

All state employees and maybe retirees get a paycut. cut 10-30% or more if necessary. whatever it takes to balance the budget. reduce work week to 3-4 days if necessary.

On second thought, there is a better way to get more money. Just lobby the feds for a bailout. Why cut when you can get a free bailout?

They need to do what I have seen in other companies. I worked for an electronics manufacturer years ago. They owners sold the company. The new owners came in and made everyone re-apply for their jobs. You basically had to explain to them why they needed to keep you. They probably laid off about 30% of the workforce and never missed a beat on production or quality. There were so many people who had been hired on for one thing or another then ended up sticking around that they were just clogging up the system.

I see it in the little town I work in. There is the public works officer. His job really is about a 20 hour a week job, but he works it full time. Fine, if they want to pay him to be around full time just in case, no problem. But he has an assistant and a secretary. He has told me himself that on most days he gets 5-10 calls that are work related and about 10-20 emails. All his secretary does is answer the phones and respond to his email. His assistant gets his lunch, washes his car and does whatever including running the city wide fantasy sports leagues. He told me that if the city bought him a Blackberry or an Iphone (something email capable) they could get rid of both of them and he wouldn't miss them. Combined these two people probably make around 70-80K a year. They could replace that with a $100 a month phone, but won't, yet they say they don't have the money to fill a couple of huge potholes on some of the roads.

Your idea is very good, even better than mine. I forgot about firing everyone and hiring them back. I know it's been done with entire police departments before.

Even if they hire everyone back, it might be good to put a little fear into the employees (by firing them) to increase productivity. I dont know much about human resources, so I cant say for sure that it's a good idea.

With the company I worked for they did it in an interesting way. You filled out your application and handed it in just like you were applying for a job. Over the course of a week or so they called everyone in one at a time and interviewed them. Then after all the interviews were done they sent everyone home early on a friday, told you to take all your personal belongings and that you would be paid for the full day. They also and told you that you would hear from them over the weekend.

I got a call Friday afternoon telling me I would be brought back and to be in at regular time Monday morning. Those who didn't get brought back were told that their access keys had been shut off so they had no access to the building and that their last checks had already been mailed. I guess it worked well because this way they didn't have to deal with any angry employees doing something stupid. I once worked for a company that laid a bunch of people off at the beginning of their shift and had a guy flip out. He attacked his manager and it took a few guys to hold him down and restrain him.

All of that sounds great and trust me, I am all for it and so are many many more people. But the reality is, public unions are far too strong. What needs to be done with the public Works sector is going to be very difficult to pull off because of the unions. Any time the government tries to make the public sector a little more on par with what reality is, it falls out. Those unions have so many votes they can pull from a politician it just overpowers any other group.

Colorado is really swinging their dick right now, I'm really impressed. Democrat governor too, which are usually very pro union. Not only is he getting teacher tenure changed but he is also trying to work in changes to the pension program so that it doesn't crash and burn within the next decade.

If public jobs were more on par with what the private sector requires, I really think we would see a lot of changes taking place. And not just the financial aspect. I'm talking worker aspect. Now don't get me wrong, some public employees are fantastic and they love their job and do it well. But the ones that don't should face the same repercussions that bad private employees do.