LA Times (March 16)
“Californians may be inured to rolling blackouts that cut off their power for hours at a time, but imagine an outage that darkens the entire country — for more than a year.” A federal report, disclosed by the Wall Street Journal, shows this “nightmare scenario” could result if just nine critical substations were knocked out. Officials need to take action and “address the frightening challenges posed by the grid’s reliance on custom-fitted equipment that can take months, if not years, to replace.”
Tags: Action, Blackouts, California, Challenges, Equipment, Grid, Nightmare, Outage, Power, Scenario, Substations
The Los Angeles Times (January 26, 2014)
After three years of severe drought, Californians are being asked to cut water usage by 20%. The drought, billed as the worst in over a century, “serves as a reminder of the urgent need for action—to plan, to conserve, to store, to reuse, to transport and to share the state’s most precious resource.”
Tags: Action, California, Conserve, Drought, Plan, Reminder, Reuse, Severe, Share Resources, Store, Transport, Urgent need, Usage, Water
USA Today (October 9)
“California lawmakers are hoping to start a new trend: states managing retirement funds on behalf of private-sector workers.” Gov. Jerry Brown has already signed a law creating a fund to which employers would pay about 3% of each worker’s salary. While this might sound appealing, this is not a good solution. “Getting states into the business of running another kind of retirement fund, when they have done such a poor job with their existing ones, is a bad idea.”
Tags: Brown, California, Private-sector, Retirement funds
The Economist (July 26)
“Europe kills entrepreneurialism…. It has created only one of the world’s 500 biggest firms since 1975; California has given birth to 26.” Among the hurdles are conservative bankruptcy laws, weak funding opportunities and inflexible labor regulations.
“Europe kills entrepreneurialism…. It has created only one of the world’s 500 biggest firms since 1975; California has given birth to 26.” Among the hurdles are conservative bankruptcy laws, weak funding opportunities and inflexible labor regulations.
Tags: Bankruptcy, California, Entrepreneurs, Europe, Funding, Labor regulations
Wall Street Journal (March 13, 2012)
Is California a Greek tragedy in the making? “The state lurches from fiscal tragedy to fiscal farce, running deficits in good times as well as bad.” Spending has soared and deficits are routine. Making the problem worse, “California’s economy, which used to outperform the rest of the country, now substantially underperforms. The unemployment rate, at 10.9%, is higher than every other state except Nevada and Rhode Island. With 12% of America’s population, California has one third of the nation’s welfare recipients.”
Tags: California, Deficit, Economy, Greece, Unemployment, Welfare
The New Yorker (September 6)
Is China going the way of Japan? Similar bubbles and certain excesses seem to indicate China may be headed for a fall. Chinese real-estate tycoon Huang Nubo unveiled plans “to buy seventy-five thousand acres of Iceland.” The “weirdness” of this recalls similar weirdness during the height of the bubble, such as a 1989 plan by the head of Nomura Securities to make California a joint yen/dollar currency zone. That was three years after “the value of the nation’s real estate doubled in a single year.” It doubled again in 1987, making Japan “the world’s largest creditor, holding thirty percent of U.S. debt, and … home to the world’s ten largest banks, with a stock exchange bigger than Wall Street.” By 1993, it was all over. Does China’s “Iceland moment” signal the end of their bubble? Or “Will it be simply a quirky milestone on the continued ascent?”
Tags: Bubble, California, China, Iceland, Japan
Los Angeles Times (May 16)
“California is a test case for whether high-speed trains can succeed in the U.S. — and so far, the state is failing the test.” The Los Angeles Times endorsed the initial plan in 2008 and still believes the benefits will “outweigh the costs, and none of the $43-billion project’s troubles are insurmountable.” There are sensible proposals for bringing the project “back on track” and these should be adopted. The high-speed rail project should not be abandoned, but it does need to be fixed to succeed.
Tags: California, Rail, Trains, U.S.
