The San Diego Union-Tribune is all about PC. The newspaper’s feature below allows you to scroll through the recent “Most Wanted” criminals — one criminal highlighted per week. A woman was recently highlighted as “Most Wanted” (scroll to find her). Her horrible crime? Using drugs and low level drug selling. Also petty theft. Really? THIS constitutes San Diego’s “Most Wanted” …
Kurt Schlichter: You’re A Fool If You’re Supporting Donald Trump (And You’re Being Exploited.)
“Imagine my surprise when I realized that you Trump fans are not supporting him ironically. You’ve taken to him like a hipster takes to vinyl – with a stubborn and mindless affinity that inexplicably disregards all facts and evidence in favor of a predetermined, and wrong, conclusion.” Read it all here.
California tech giant expands! But . . .
Good news! One of California’s tech giants is expanding! The bad news? Awww, shucks — you’re way ahead of me. Yup, the expansion is NOT in California. It’s in Austin, Texas. No surprise, as Oracle already had set up an operation down there in recent years. See the “Business Relocation Coach” article below and the link to the full Austin …
As more people retire or go on disability, median household income declines
Once again, I find insightful observations (with statistical underpinnings) on Professor Mark Perry’s “Carpe Diem” blog. Here’s a common sense explanation of at least part of the recent years’ decline in U.S. household income. Not surprisingly, as a greater percentage of people retire and/or go on “disability” (an increasingly abused government/court perk), the average/median household income declines. http://www.aei.org/publication/some-demographic-trends-that-might-explain-the-stagnation-and-decline-in-us-household-income Some demographic …
CA industrial electricity rates now almost DOUBLE the national average
My nasty updated fact for the day — from my “CA vs. the Other States” fact sheet: www.TinyURL.com/CA-vs-other-states NOTE: This online version of my fact sheet is never quite up to date (hard to change with each update). If you crave the latest dreary version of this fact sheet as a 2 page Word file, I can send it as …
Middle class IS shrinking — but 2/3 of those who left the middle class have become RICH!
The left keeps lamenting the shrinking middle class. And the middle class IS shrinking as a percentage of Americans. But here’s the the catch: Turns out that 2/3 of the middle class losses are because they moved to “rich”! Kudos to the REASON Foundation and Professor Mark Perry (who assembled the updated piece below) for sharing this insight. ——– http://www.aei.org/publication/yes-americas-middle-class-has-been-disappearing-into-higher-income-groups/ AEI …
Most of latest annual CA population increase is due to people living longer
The latest one year California population figures have been published (through 1 July, 2015). Some trends and facts are worth noting. http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/2015/dec/16/californias-population-grows-to-nearly-391-million/ California’s population is now about 39,100,000 million, an increase of 350,000 people — about a 0.9% increase for the 12 months. The number of births was 507,000. We peaked at about 612,000 births in 1990, and have been …
Escondido City Attorney with 12 employees is paid more than San Diego City Attorney with 355 employees
How overpaid is the Escondido City Attorney? You decide. The Escondido City Attorney employs 7 attorneys (counting himself) and 6 staff. https://www.escondido.org/Data/Sites/1/media/PDFs/Finance/PreliminaryOperatingBudget1516.pdf page 14 The San Diego City Attorney has 155 attorneys working under his management, and 355 employees total. http://www.sandiego.gov/fm/annual/pdf/fy16/vol2/v2cityattorney.pdf San Diego runs a big misdemeanor department, handling FAR more issues and cases than the backwater Escondido City Attorney’s …
CA median homeowner property tax is 93% higher than the average of the other 49 states!
“Because of Prop 13, our property taxes are low in California.” Well, at least that’s the mantra of the MSM and the CA progressives. Facts say otherwise. According to recent figures graciously provided me by RealtyTrac — a highly respected national firm — the 2014 average CA single-family residence (SFR) property tax is the 8th highest state in the nation. Our …
Kiplinger ranks CA as worst state to retire in — but their methodology is sometimes sloppy
My attention was drawn to a recent Kiplinger study purporting to compare the attractiveness of states for retirees. It took five minutes for me to verify the report constitutes sloppy work. I’m genuinely puzzled how and why a supposedly reputable financial advisory firm would distribute such a slipshod analysis. But, as I point out below, at least Kiplinger got California …
El Cajon State of the City Address
Please come to the El Cajon State of the City Address this coming Tuesday, Dec 8th at 2:00 pm, in the City Council Chambers. I will be detailing the accomplishments of El Cajon over the past year, as well as the vision for the future. There will be a reception immediately after the address at the Public Safety Center. I hope …
AFL-CIO study of CEO-worker pay is incredibly flawed — yet universally accepted by MSM
The MSM enthusiastically distributes the annual AFL-CIO study comparing big company CEO pay with all workers — informally the “400 to 1” comparison. But the dishonesty of the labor union report is obvious, breathtaking — and completely ignored. Below is a detailed debunking of this “study.” Perhaps the biggest “error” (it’s no error!) is the inclusion of part-time workers in …
Imaginary memo reveals Amazon’s delight with CA’s stifling legislation hobbling CA “brick and mortar” businesses
FLASH!! Here’s a super-secret memo (admittedly it’s so secret that I made it up) I imagine I just received from a whistleblower — an internal communique circulating at Amazon: HAPPY THANKSGIVING! We at Amazon have much to be thankful for this Turkey Day. Speaking of blessings (and turkeys), with the latest California bill proposing to mandate double time wages for …
My Applebee’s robot waitress — auditioning for the human waiter’s job
Last night I took my wife and our two young grandchildren to Applebee’s. It went great — our 4 and 2 year old charges were more decorous than half the patrons. But I digress. Here’s what caught my attention: Applebee’s is testing a new ordering policy — using the technology that is rapidly becoming prominent in fast food restaurants. Every …
“Broken promises at Grossmont-Cuyamaca”
SDUT: “Tuesday’s Grossmont-Cuyamaca Community College District board meeting offered a graphic example of why politicians have among the worst reputations of any occupational category in the world.” Read today’s editorial. Also: “The Grossmont-Cuyamaca Community College District governing board went back on a promise it made three years ago and voted 3-0 Tuesday night to negotiate a project labor agreement with …
Texas COL-adjusted median household income is much higher than CA – UPDATED 2014
I’ve updated my salient median household income comparison of California vs. hated Texas. My last figures were from 2009. Since then it’s gotten even better — for Texas. According to recent U.S. census figures, the 2014 median household income in California is still significantly higher than Texas. CA — $60,487 TX — $53,875 — 10.9% less than CA (vs. 18.1% less …
Why is the California disability unemployment rate much higher than in 1971? We pay people not to work.
A common canard is that government doesn’t work. It DOES work — just often not the way intended. If we pay people not to work (including SSI and SSDI), fewer people opt to work. It works EXACTLY as any honest economist would predict. With SSI, one has to PROVE that one can’t work in order to receive the benefits. Ignoring …
Small company uses wrong FONT on its pillow labels — driven out of business by state
Okay, I’m exaggerating, but only a bit. This costly label “font” mandate was one of several state-imposed regulations that drove this small company under. At its peak, this Chico firm employed 30 people. Since none of them were union members, politicians simply don’t much care that these workers are now unemployed. Indeed, as unemployed, these folks are more likely than …
The Sacramento Strategy to Undo Proposition 13
This op-ed originally appeared in the Flashreport Serving in the Legislature for six years, I had a front row seat to the culture in Sacramento where operatives strategize and execute plans to continuously raise your taxes to fund an ever expanding state government. For the first time in years, our state budget is running a surplus, and yet the demand …
Breaking story: Jerry Brown used state experts to seek oil on family land
Here’s a breaking bizarre news story, the result of an Associated Press Investigation just released today (Thursday, 11/5/15). Apparently CA Governor Jerry Brown sought and received extensive geological services from a government agency, mapping out the prospects for finding oil on his family’s land. According to this write-up of the facts by Breitbart, these services are normally never available to …
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