Posts Tagged ‘California fiscal crisis’

GovPensionPerk.con


Monday July 8th, 2013   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 7:59am PDT   •   6 Comments

Calculating the cost of government is a difficult task but as a general rule the costs will always be higher than taxpayers imagine. A California case shows why this is so. Pension plans, including those in government, include contributions by the employer and the employee. The employee contribution of Susan Muranishi, an administrator in…
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Negative Net Worth in the Golden State


Wednesday April 3rd, 2013   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 9:58am PDT   •   10 Comments

Columnist Paul Krugman denies that “liberal big spending and overpaid public employees were bringing on collapse” in California, and he parrots governor Jerry Brown’s claim that the Golden State is on the comeback trail. Before joining the celebration, taxpayers might examine a new report from the Bureau of State Audits that pegs California’s net…
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Golden State Gravy Train


Monday December 24th, 2012   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 8:30am PST   •   4 Comments

The November election made California the highest-tax state in the nation by raising the state income tax to 13.3 percent, an increase of 29.13 percent. Governor Jerry Brown claimed the increase would boost revenues by some $6 billion and solve the Golden State’s budgetary woes. But according to state Controller John Chiang, total state…
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Government Hides Money, Cont’d


Wednesday November 21st, 2012   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 8:00am PST   •   3 Comments

As we noted in July, the California Parks Department managed to hide $54 million for 12 years. For more than a decade, the California Department of Finance, responsible for such matters, failed to find the money. But apparently performance has improved. The same Finance Department managed to find an additional $1.4 billion available for…
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The Government Gospel of Greed


Monday November 5th, 2012   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 11:42am PST   •   3 Comments

As this column shows, government waste, fraud and abuse is rampant at all levels. Seldom, however, has any politician attempted to give divine sanction to government greed in the style of California Governor Jerry Brown, who once wanted a California space program and recently signed off on a $68 billion railroad train. The former…
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Stumping for Waste: Amtrak Subsidies Become a Campaign Issue


Wednesday September 12th, 2012   •   Posted by K. Lloyd Billingsley at 10:05am PDT   •   7 Comments

Last year 30 million passengers road Amtrak, which on September 10 announced monthly ridership records for the last 11 months. That should come as no surprise with gasoline above $4 a gallon in much of the country. But Amtrak bosses, doubtless looking for more federal handouts, left out a few realities. Last year Amtrak…
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Is America Now More a Nation of Takers than Makers?


Friday April 1st, 2011   •   Posted by David Theroux at 2:11pm PDT   •   4 Comments

In a new article for the Wall Street Journal, “We’ve Become a Nation of Takers, Not Makers,” Stephen Moore discusses that “More Americans work for the government than in manufacturing, farming, fishing, forestry, mining and utilities combined.” If you want to understand better why so many states—from New York to Wisconsin to California—are teetering…
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The Government Union Stronghold on California


Monday March 7th, 2011   •   Posted by Emily Skarbek at 2:26pm PST   •   5 Comments

San Jose City Councilman Pete Constant wants to answer his office phone but the City Hall employees’ union says he should not be allowed to do so. The union has taken the Councilman to court, attempting to force him to hire someone else to be his administrative assistant and answer phones for $70,000 a…
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