Texas Vs. California: 13 Days Before the Election Roundup

With the election less than two weeks away, time for a roundup of how the champions of their respective political models (Texas for Red States and California for Blue States) are doing:

  • Why is gasoline so expensive in California? Because Californian politicians have made it that expensive. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
  • California is getting ready to shovel more benefits to public employee union members. Because retiring at age 50 with 90% of their salary just wasn’t enough.
  • Bankrupt San Bernadino stops paying into the CalPERS pension fund. (Previously.
  • Moody’s: “we expect…more bankruptcy filings and bond defaults among California cities, reflecting the increased risk to bondholders as investors are asked to contribute to plans for closing budget gaps.”
  • It’s all part of California’s Fifty Shades of Golden electoral masochism. “Not surprising, the most productive of California’s citizens are leaving in droves. For those who want to prosper, the safeword is “Texas.'”
  • The guy from California who under-reported unemployment to make the numbers look better? Obama donor. This is my shocked face.
  • California has actually carried out some pension reforms (like capping annual benefits at $132,000), but its pension plans are still underfunded by $165 billion.
  • California got $411 million in the National Mortgage Settlement. So how much of that actually went to help people with their mortgages? None of it. “Think of California’s persistent budget deficit as a great white shark devouring every source of cash in its path.”
  • Might California voters finally be reaching a tipping point against big government? Answer cloudy, ask again later.
  • Texas continues to add jobs.
  • Moreover, they’re not low wage jobs either:

    The total personal income (TPI) in Texas reached $1.07 trillion dollars in the second quarter of this year, according to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis. That’s an increase of 71 percent from the state’s corresponding total 10 years earlier, $626.7 billion.

    Here’s another way of looking at it: Texas accounted for 8.02 percent of the nation’s TPI this year, up 1.10 percentage points from 6.92 percent in 2002.

    That’s nearly five times larger than the runner-up, Florida, which increased its share of national TPI by 0.23 points in a decade. Just four other states registered gains better than a tenth of a point.

  • Texas has the best unemployment rate among the five biggest states, at 6.8%. California, at 10.2%, has the worst.
  • Texas’ tort reform has attracted medical specialists to the state at a rate outstripping population growth.
  • Texas added 262,700 private sector jobs over the last year.
  • And Dwight, as usual, has more on the goings-ons in Golden State locales like Oakland and Bell.

    • (Hat tips for many Texas items: WILLisms’ Twitter feed.)

    By Lawrence Person

    Lawrence Person is a political commentator and science fiction writer living in Austin, Texas. His political work has appeared in National Review, Reason, The Freeman, Liberty and The World & I. His SF has appeared in Asimov's, Analog, F&SF, Postscripts, Jim Baen's Universe, Fear, and several anthologies. He owns such a large library (mostly science fiction first editions) he had to buy a two-story house to put it in, and then adopted a golden retriever to drag him out of his house on a regular basis.

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