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California will elect a new governor next year, which means it is time for the field of Democratic candidates to talk about how affordability is their top concern and offer policies that will continue to make California unaffordable for lower and middle-class families.
Shortly after entering a field full of Democratic mediocrities, Rep. Eric Swalwell declared that Californians want a “fighter, a protector, and a get shit done approach on lowering prices.” Tony Thurmond, the terrible state superintendent, said that he is “done letting billionaires skate by while working families get crushed,” and that he will be “leveling the damn playing field for every hardworking Californian” by making sure that $100 millionaires pay their fair share.”
NEWSOM CONTINUES TO SPEND CALIFORNIA INTO A BUDGET HOLE
Billionaire Tom Steyer is focusing his campaign on affordability, claiming he can get the state to build one million homes in four years by cutting regulations and taxes — Steyer is a climate zealot. Former Rep. Katie Porter, former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, former state attorney general and U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, and former state controller Betty Yee have all talked about affordability being central to their campaign in some way.
The Golden State has become known for its brutal cost of living. According to an analysis of Internal Revenue Service data, California loses a taxpayer every minute, while more affordable states, such as Florida and Texas, gain a new taxpayer every two to three minutes. California suffered a net population loss of 412,000 people from July 2020 to July 2023. California has since reversed that population loss, but the state is growing slowly compared to the rest of the country. As of last year, it is projected that the state will lose four more congressional seats and Electoral College votes, based on the 2030 Census, with Texas and Florida projected to gain four each. California had gained congressional seats in every census reapportionment in its history until 2010, with 2020 being the first time the state ever lost a seat.
According to U.S. News & World Report, California ranks last in the country in affordability and opportunity, 46th in employment, and 45th in economic growth. It’s tied as the highest poverty rate in the country when adjusted for cost of living. According to TurboTax, California has the fourth-highest tax burden among all states, behind only Hawaii, New York, and Vermont. California also has the highest unemployment rate among all states. Californians can’t afford houses, are hit with heavy taxes, and aren’t given opportunities to improve their financial situations under the crushing weight of high prices driven by taxes and burdensome regulations.
Cost of California living
California’s Democratic candidates for governor can talk all they want about making the state more affordable, but the fact is that the California Democratic Party has been in the position to do so for years. Democrats have had unbroken control of the state Senate since 1975 and have controlled the state Assembly since 1970, except for a two-year GOP majority from 1995 to 1996. Since 1999, California has been governed by a Democrat, with the exception of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s eight-year tenure that ended in 2011. Democrats have had a monopoly on power since then, a 14-year stretch to make the state more affordable. Instead, the opposite has happened.
The Democrats who are claiming they can bring prices down for Californians are part of the same Democratic Party apparatus that made those prices so high in the first place. Becerra, Yee, and Thurmond have all recently served in the state government as California has become more unaffordable. Villaraigosa served in the state legislature, and Porter and Swalwell were Democratic culture warriors in Congress. The only outside-the-box candidate is Steyer, whose focus on affordability runs contrary to his support of environmental regulations.
Porter is the only candidate who has suggested that she would be willing to kill the high-speed rail project. That project has become a money furnace for California taxpayers. She is positioning herself as a reasonable moderate while still keeping the door open for the high-speed rail project to move forward. Which way do you think she will actually fall when the time comes for her to make a decision? Likely the same way as every other prominent Democratic politician in the state, including the ones she is running against.
This is how it is likely to go on every issue. These candidates can talk about lowering the gas tax or possibly easing up on the state’s war against the oil industry, but none will follow through. Californians will still face an electric vehicle mandate and the brutal environmental regulation regime that makes housing so expensive. We know this because this is exactly how California Democrats talk. For example, let’s look at Gov. Gavin Newsom’s view of the high-speed rail before he was elected.
Newsom supported the project in 2007, saying, “We absolutely need this,” ahead of the 2008 ballot proposition that would approve a bond for the project. Then, in 2014, as he prepared for his future run for governor, Newsom said he would rather redirect the money to other infrastructure projects and that he had the same level of opposition as California voters, who had turned against the project.
Newsom then continued to shovel taxpayer money into the furnace, instead of addressing those other infrastructure projects he was worried about by raising the gas tax.
THE CALIFORNIA MODEL: SEX CRIMES AND TRAFFICKING
Will any of the candidates bring down taxes? It’s unlikely, given that they want to perpetuate bloated state programs and potentially add their own. That requires money, and California is in a perpetual cycle of running a budget deficit and “cutting,” i.e., delaying, funds for many programs it has now. Steyer and Thurmond are among those calling for taxing billionaires and corporations so that they pay their “fair share.” However, the inevitable result is that more of those people and businesses move to another state, and everyday Californians are then forced to fund the programs that “need” to be financed. After all, that is exactly what happened with the gas tax, which was deemed necessary because California Democrats could find the money to fix the state’s roads in its more than $400 billion budget.
What will happen in California over the next eight years is entirely predictable. One of those Democrats, probably Porter, will be elected. She will do almost nothing to reduce costs, instead focusing on funding failing programs and raising taxes to pay for those programs. About six years later, the next crop of candidates will begin campaigning on bringing down costs, repeating the same cycle of vague half-promises and new taxes and spending programs. This will continue until California voters choose to break the Democratic monopoly in power, because this is the California Democratic Party’s modus operandi.
