Business & Economics
Business & Economics
Proving the Redevelopment Rule
Doug Tessitor is the mayor of Glendora, a city in Los Angeles County. He’s a self-described conservative and dead certain that preserving California’s redevelopment agencies (RDAs) is essential to his city’s fiscal health. In a pair of recent online columns, Tessitor mounted an impassioned defense of redevelopment in response to ...
Business & Economics
Government‚ Get Out of My Face(book)
The Social Networking Privacy Act (SB 242), authored by state senator Ellen Corbett‚ a San Leandro Democrat‚ would force any social networking site to make new users choose their privacy settings when they register and make the default settings private except for the user’s name and city of residence. This ...
Business & Economics
Prisoner of the Union
When California governor Jerry Brown announced details last month of a two-year contract that he’d negotiated with California’s prison guards’ union, you could practically hear the sighs of disappointment from stalwarts who had hoped that the 73-year-old maverick might take on a few vested interests as he tried to close ...
Commentary
Candid Romney Would Own Up To Mass. Fiasco
Massachusetts health reform is in the news driven by reports of long waits for care and its architect’s presidential ambitions. Former Massachusetts governor and GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney delivered a widely panned speech the week before last on health care. The three-part speech attempted the impossible: It defended ...
Business & Economics
Open Government Requires More Sunshine
The city of Bell pay scandal highlighted serious flaws in California’s open-government laws. Now a proposed constitutional change wants the people to guarantee more sunshine to the Golden State. That’s how government openness was achieved in the past, through action by citizens and news organizations. After World War II, it ...
Business & Economics
Prop. 13 still the Left’s bogeyman
California has become such a basket case that outsiders are starting to parachute in and report on the tales of woe from our deficit-racked, economically stagnant and politically dysfunctional state. It makes for good reading for a broader audience, and the reporters can enjoy themselves at the beach or at ...
Business & Economics
The tea party should hold fast on debt ceiling
Two weeks ago, Standard and Poor’s kept the U.S. government’s AAA debt rating, but downgraded its future outlook from “stable” to “negative.” The announcement roiled stock markets and underscored the need for tea party activists to keep legislators’ feet to the fire on the debt ceiling. Paul Ryan’s allegedly radical ...
Business & Economics
Best/Worst States for Business
More than 500 CEOs considered a wide range of criteria, from taxation and regulation to workforce quality and living environment, in our annual ranking of the best states for business. The charts and articles in this special report show how each state fares on the factors most essential for a ...
Business & Economics
Public servants – more money, less accountability
Union arguments in favor of their members’ lush pensions are falling by the wayside as the public examines the facts. For instance, union officials argue that the average public-sector pension benefit in California is “only” $30,000 a year, while neglecting to mention that the number, according to the state’s watchdog ...
Business & Economics
How to dilute the power of politicians
When I lived in Iowa, I was an average citizen, and, one day, I had a question for the governor’s office for an article I was writing for a small newsletter. I called the Capitol number and was transferred to an aide, who responded with something to this effect: “Why ...
Proving the Redevelopment Rule
Doug Tessitor is the mayor of Glendora, a city in Los Angeles County. He’s a self-described conservative and dead certain that preserving California’s redevelopment agencies (RDAs) is essential to his city’s fiscal health. In a pair of recent online columns, Tessitor mounted an impassioned defense of redevelopment in response to ...
Government‚ Get Out of My Face(book)
The Social Networking Privacy Act (SB 242), authored by state senator Ellen Corbett‚ a San Leandro Democrat‚ would force any social networking site to make new users choose their privacy settings when they register and make the default settings private except for the user’s name and city of residence. This ...
Prisoner of the Union
When California governor Jerry Brown announced details last month of a two-year contract that he’d negotiated with California’s prison guards’ union, you could practically hear the sighs of disappointment from stalwarts who had hoped that the 73-year-old maverick might take on a few vested interests as he tried to close ...
Candid Romney Would Own Up To Mass. Fiasco
Massachusetts health reform is in the news driven by reports of long waits for care and its architect’s presidential ambitions. Former Massachusetts governor and GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney delivered a widely panned speech the week before last on health care. The three-part speech attempted the impossible: It defended ...
Open Government Requires More Sunshine
The city of Bell pay scandal highlighted serious flaws in California’s open-government laws. Now a proposed constitutional change wants the people to guarantee more sunshine to the Golden State. That’s how government openness was achieved in the past, through action by citizens and news organizations. After World War II, it ...
Prop. 13 still the Left’s bogeyman
California has become such a basket case that outsiders are starting to parachute in and report on the tales of woe from our deficit-racked, economically stagnant and politically dysfunctional state. It makes for good reading for a broader audience, and the reporters can enjoy themselves at the beach or at ...
The tea party should hold fast on debt ceiling
Two weeks ago, Standard and Poor’s kept the U.S. government’s AAA debt rating, but downgraded its future outlook from “stable” to “negative.” The announcement roiled stock markets and underscored the need for tea party activists to keep legislators’ feet to the fire on the debt ceiling. Paul Ryan’s allegedly radical ...
Best/Worst States for Business
More than 500 CEOs considered a wide range of criteria, from taxation and regulation to workforce quality and living environment, in our annual ranking of the best states for business. The charts and articles in this special report show how each state fares on the factors most essential for a ...
Public servants – more money, less accountability
Union arguments in favor of their members’ lush pensions are falling by the wayside as the public examines the facts. For instance, union officials argue that the average public-sector pension benefit in California is “only” $30,000 a year, while neglecting to mention that the number, according to the state’s watchdog ...
How to dilute the power of politicians
When I lived in Iowa, I was an average citizen, and, one day, I had a question for the governor’s office for an article I was writing for a small newsletter. I called the Capitol number and was transferred to an aide, who responded with something to this effect: “Why ...
