Posts Tagged ‘Richmond (California)’
Thursday, April 2nd, 2015
Time for another Texas vs. California roundup. The Texas House passed a budget, but I haven’t had a chance to look at it in any detail yet…
Unemployment rates in February: National average is 5.5%, Texas at 4.3%, California at 6.7%.
Even though hiring slowed to 7,100 new jobs in Texas in February, it was still the 53rd straight month of positive job creation, and Texas added 357,300 new jobs over the preceding 12 months.
A report from the Dallas Fed goes into more details.
California institutes mandatory water restrictions due to drought. California is indeed suffering a horrific drought, but it’s imposition of or acquiescence to idiotic environmental restrictions (see also: Delta Smelt) have made things much worse.
Some have proposed free market solutions to California’s water problems.
Workers comp abuse at LAPD/LAFD. (Hat tip: Pension Tsunami.)
Add Richmond, California to the list of cities that have radically underfunded their public employee retirement plans. “The shortfall of $446 million works out to about $4,150 for every city resident.” (Ditto.)
San Bernardino reveals its bankruptcy deal with CalPERS. (Hat tip: Pension Tsunami.)
Volokh the Younger examines the legal framework around the California rule (“not only that public employees are entitled to the pension they’ve accrued by their work so far, but also that they’re entitled to keep earning a pension (as long they continue in their job) according to rules that are at least as generous”), as well as its practical effects:
The California rule distorts what the salary/pension mix would otherwise be, given employer and employee preferences, and given the tax code as it is. Because underfunded pensions are a popular form of deficit spending, public employee compensation may already be too pension-heavy, and the rule makes it more so by freezing pensions in times of retrenchment. The incentive effects of the rule, given the political economy of government employment, may well exacerbate this tendency. And the possible theoretical reasons for preferring a pension-heavy mix don’t go very far in justifying this particular distortion.
California runs out of room on death row. Maybe they could subcontract to Texas…
Fresno’s deputy police chief busted on drug charges.
Tags:Alexander Volokh, California, Fresno, LAFD, LAPD, Los Angeles, pension crisis, Richmond (California), San Bernardino, Texas, unemployment, unions, Welfare State
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