Kerry Jackson

Blog

Latest Data Shows ‘California Premium’ Chasing More People Out of State

Using U.S. Census Bureau data, the Los Angeles Times reported last week that net migration from April 2020 to July 2022 was a 699,904-person loss for California as that many more moved out than moved in. That’s a loss greater than the population of the entire state of Vermont. (CalMatters ...
Blog

Maze of red tape impedes urban business growth

Maze of red tape impedes urban business growth By Kerry Jackson | February 17, 2023 Humanity flourishes when it’s free. Minds innovate, human capital is liberated and the ambitious get to work when they’re not interrupted by restrictive licensing and other bureaucratic hurdles that pose impenetrable barriers to personal and ...
Commentary

Blame California Environmental Polices for the Spike in Natural Gas Prices

A governor who has come to be perpetually angry about something or the other is demanding a federal probe into natural gas prices in California and other Western states. Gov. Gavin Newsom just has to know why prices “have risen to alarming levels.” If he’d shuffle some of the papers ...
Blog

Court Slows The FAST Act, But Business Exodus Could Accelerate

The FAST Act (AB257), which was scheduled to go into effect Jan. 1, “makes it all but impossible to run small business restaurants” in California, says Joe Erlinger, president of McDonald’s USA, in an open letter that appears on the company’s corporate website. The top of the Jan. 25 letter, ...
Blog

San Diego Fires Latest Salvo in Government’s War on Cars

Not too long ago, San Diego was, if not a haven of conservatism with a libertarian flavor, at least a break from the stifling progressivism of Los Angeles. It’s becoming increasingly more difficult to tell the differences between, though. The latest shift to the left: San Diego is at war ...
California

Shocking! Why California Policymakers Are So Often Caught by Surprise

California is always in the national news and too often for not-so-good reasons. A couple of recent events has left much of the rest of the country wondering how this ever-swaggering state is continually caught off guard. There’s really no mystery here. The answer is obvious. When it was announced ...
Blog

Latest Reasons Why Residents Continue to Flee San Francisco

“Budget shortfalls pose an existential threat” to the “long-term viability” of transit services across the state. “Bay Area operators,” says a group of six state senators and seven assembly members, “face significant annual shortfalls,” leaving agencies such as BART no choice but “to cut multiple lines of service as early ...
Commentary

State nowhere near meeting unrealistic energy goals, and that’s a good thing

California is barreling toward its 2030 greenhouse gas emissions target. Will it make it? The Legislative Analyst’s Office doesn’t seem to think so. By statute, emissions are to be at 40 percent of 1990 levels by 2030, then 85 percent below by 2045. The California Air Resources Board recently set ...
Business & Economics

Latest State Minimum Wage Hike Will Hurt Workers Far More Than It Helps

2023 might be the year that California businesses, especially small ones outside of the larger cities, wish they could skip. On top of a likely economic downturn, they have also been hit with higher employee costs, as another increase in the minimum wage arrived on Jan. 1. The state minimum ...
Blog

Private options could reverse transit ridership drops

One way to measure a city’s greatness is the ease of getting around: Does its public transit system improve or undermine its quality of life? In the 20th century, New York, London, Paris, Chicago, Berlin and Chicago were generally held in high regard for efficiently and quickly moving people through ...
Blog

Latest Data Shows ‘California Premium’ Chasing More People Out of State

Using U.S. Census Bureau data, the Los Angeles Times reported last week that net migration from April 2020 to July 2022 was a 699,904-person loss for California as that many more moved out than moved in. That’s a loss greater than the population of the entire state of Vermont. (CalMatters ...
Blog

Maze of red tape impedes urban business growth

Maze of red tape impedes urban business growth By Kerry Jackson | February 17, 2023 Humanity flourishes when it’s free. Minds innovate, human capital is liberated and the ambitious get to work when they’re not interrupted by restrictive licensing and other bureaucratic hurdles that pose impenetrable barriers to personal and ...
Commentary

Blame California Environmental Polices for the Spike in Natural Gas Prices

A governor who has come to be perpetually angry about something or the other is demanding a federal probe into natural gas prices in California and other Western states. Gov. Gavin Newsom just has to know why prices “have risen to alarming levels.” If he’d shuffle some of the papers ...
Blog

Court Slows The FAST Act, But Business Exodus Could Accelerate

The FAST Act (AB257), which was scheduled to go into effect Jan. 1, “makes it all but impossible to run small business restaurants” in California, says Joe Erlinger, president of McDonald’s USA, in an open letter that appears on the company’s corporate website. The top of the Jan. 25 letter, ...
Blog

San Diego Fires Latest Salvo in Government’s War on Cars

Not too long ago, San Diego was, if not a haven of conservatism with a libertarian flavor, at least a break from the stifling progressivism of Los Angeles. It’s becoming increasingly more difficult to tell the differences between, though. The latest shift to the left: San Diego is at war ...
California

Shocking! Why California Policymakers Are So Often Caught by Surprise

California is always in the national news and too often for not-so-good reasons. A couple of recent events has left much of the rest of the country wondering how this ever-swaggering state is continually caught off guard. There’s really no mystery here. The answer is obvious. When it was announced ...
Blog

Latest Reasons Why Residents Continue to Flee San Francisco

“Budget shortfalls pose an existential threat” to the “long-term viability” of transit services across the state. “Bay Area operators,” says a group of six state senators and seven assembly members, “face significant annual shortfalls,” leaving agencies such as BART no choice but “to cut multiple lines of service as early ...
Commentary

State nowhere near meeting unrealistic energy goals, and that’s a good thing

California is barreling toward its 2030 greenhouse gas emissions target. Will it make it? The Legislative Analyst’s Office doesn’t seem to think so. By statute, emissions are to be at 40 percent of 1990 levels by 2030, then 85 percent below by 2045. The California Air Resources Board recently set ...
Business & Economics

Latest State Minimum Wage Hike Will Hurt Workers Far More Than It Helps

2023 might be the year that California businesses, especially small ones outside of the larger cities, wish they could skip. On top of a likely economic downturn, they have also been hit with higher employee costs, as another increase in the minimum wage arrived on Jan. 1. The state minimum ...
Blog

Private options could reverse transit ridership drops

One way to measure a city’s greatness is the ease of getting around: Does its public transit system improve or undermine its quality of life? In the 20th century, New York, London, Paris, Chicago, Berlin and Chicago were generally held in high regard for efficiently and quickly moving people through ...
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