So I've been hearing about this "New California". Any west coasters able to shed a better light on this?
In a nutshell, the rural Republican counties want to break off from the Democratic population centers of San Francisco, L.A., and Sacramento to form the 51st state. There is precedent for this (West Virginia, the Carolinas, etc).
I'm sure the chances are tiny of it happening, but it's interesting.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cascadia_(independence_movement)
yawn err body thinks they are special..
Interesting.
Though my 4th grade teacher would be upset if I didn’t point out that the Carolinas were never the same colony, let alone a single state.
Look up the state of Jefferson.
Similar grumblings are happening in Oregon where 2 cities constitute an majority vote, essentially 2 cities are running the entire state.
It's another in a long line of NorCal being tired of Socal dictating everything.
Honestly the only caveat they should have forced upon them is that their flag must have a two headed bear or it's not allowed.
bentwrench said:Look up the state of Jefferson.
Similar grumblings are happening in Oregon where 2 cities constitute an majority vote, essentially 2 cities are running the entire state.
that's because a majority of the people live in those two cities...
Grizz said:It's another in a long line of NorCal being tired of Socal dictating everything....
Not a north and south thing. It's a coast vs inland thing.
Not going to happen of course. The ones who want the split are inland, They want the split because the coast has the legislature. The legislature has to approve the split.... not happening.
The really silly part is the VAST majority of the wealth and tax revenue comes from the coast. The top 1% of earners in CA pay 45% of the taxes. They are of course on the coast, and most the top 20% are also.
What's the twist? The inland area has ALL the water!!
There are 5 or 6 different California split movements, including one for the whole state to secede. Very unlikely any of them will happen.
There have been numerous proposals to divide the state every which way. There are numerous conflicting interests depending on the part of the state, yet most of it is governed by small geographical areas due to the population density. To many people in that state, it's like Georgia being governed by New York. If you look at a map by counties, the bluest state in the nation turns bright red over most of it's area.
While the vast majority of the wealth and tax payers are near the coast, that might change a bit if the new state was significantly more tax and business friendly, which is a pretty low bar.
Of course the likelihood of this happening is pretty close to nil.
There was a similar, though reversed proposal, where the gulf coast region wanted to split from their parent states and form one new single state. Needles to say that didn't get far.
Having lived a good portion of my life in areas where you are much more likely to see "Love it or Leave it!" bumper stickers on a truck than "Coexist", I always find these movements amusing. After all, they choose to live in California so where is the unadulterated love for the state? Kansas should be a utopia for them.
I'd be fine with splitting California into north and south provided it stayed relatively proportional in voter registration. Which would mean NoCal gets San Francisco. Mostly just to get the size a bit more manageable, not for gerrymandering.
But since 50 states is the magic number one other has to give up and be absorbed by their obvious neighbor. Rhode Island back to Connecticut or Delaware back to Maryland. Vermont and New Hampshire should be fused too I suppose. Then we can let Puerto Rico finally grow up into real statehood instead of being stuck in perpetual adolescence as a territory.
Hi, I'm Chicago, er, I mean Illinois.
How is the country of Quebec coming along?
In reply to Boost_Crazy :
I like how the poor areas are trying to tell the rich areas how to be business friendly. Isn’t California something like the 8th richest country in the world all by itself?
frenchyd said:In reply to Boost_Crazy :
I like how the poor areas are trying to tell the rich areas how to be business friendly. Isn’t California something like the 8th richest country in the world all by itself?
I think the belief is California has one of the largest economy, but is continually running a deficit and has a "wall of debt" which is the part they don't like.
I believe there was a surplus this year in the CA budget. Silicone valley is a large part of that.
The 'wall of debt' you are referring to is the state employee pension programs. In the boom economy of the 90's (remember, most of that was tech and most of the tech was in CA) law makers thought it was a great idea to pump up pensions in a big way because, hey, the boom will never end right? Well that bill is slowly coming due, and is growing each year...
Carson said:Interesting.
Though my 4th grade teacher would be upset if I didn’t point out that the Carolinas were never the same colony, let alone a single state.
But were you aware that Georgia was originally part of the colony of South Carolina?
In reply to Stampie :
I sure didn’t, but I’m a North Carolinian.
Splitting up California? Sounds like a good idea, but I'd much prefer the kind of split suggested in the 1973 Steely Dan song "My Old School."
It's been a debate in NY for years. Unfortunately it will never end, it will never happen.
It will never happen for the same reason Puerto Rico will never be a state: the U.S. Senate. Having 50 states give a nice even 100 Senators and making sure the Vice President always has a chance to split a tie vote. The only way Congress will ever approve adding another state is if they add two, thus putting the balance back in place.
Or at least that's how I see it.
In reply to Johnboyjjb :
Mountain of debt? Not based on any objective measurement of debt. It’s like I had 5 mortgage payments left and my total debt is paid off.
Besides it seems that fiscal conservatism has left the nation.
Approve a bunch and see if we can get up to 60 states.
frenchyd said:In reply to Johnboyjjb :
Mountain of debt? Not based on any objective measurement of debt. It’s like I had 5 mortgage payments left and my total debt is paid off.
Besides it seems that fiscal conservatism has left the nation.
I'm not involved but the basis for that commentary come from Google listing California having a GDP of ~2.5 trillion in 2015, which is big, and when I looked for California debt, the first three articles I found reference 1.5 Trillion in unfunded debt. Since GDP doesn't equal tax revenues, which revenues for budget =$118 billion in 2016. Presuming those numbers are accurate and stable you will have 127 annual payments of all of the budget just towards debt payment with no operating budget for those 127 years. That seems to me, as an outside observer, to be more than 5 small mortgage payments. The smallest debt balance I saw was $400 billion, which probably excludes the local municipalities debts that are included in the trillion dollar discussion. But even at $400 billion, that would require 4 easy payments of all of your money to pay off. That's four years with literally no money for services. Doesn't seem to be a fair analogy.
https://californiapolicycenter.org/californias-total-state-local-debt-totals-1-3-trillion/
http://www.ebudget.ca.gov/2016-17/pdf/BudgetSummary/RevenueEstimates.pdf
https://www.ocregister.com/2017/09/27/will-california-ever-pay-off-its-massive-debt/
https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/California-s-400-billion-debt-worries-analysts-6812264.php
slefain said:It will never happen for the same reason Puerto Rico will never be a state: the U.S. Senate. Having 50 states give a nice even 100 Senators and making sure the Vice President always has a chance to split a tie vote. The only way Congress will ever approve adding another state is if they add two, thus putting the balance back in place.
Or at least that's how I see it.
51 states would be 102 senators, which is still capable of being evenly split...
California's tax revenues vary widely with the stock market health because capital gains are treated as normal income and taxed at the marginal rate of around 10% (or more). Combine this with a lot of stock-option based compensation for tech industry employees, and a much larger percentage of CA's budget is related to stock market health. The market went up a lot last year, so lots of tax revenue. OTOH, it gets pretty brutal when the market goes down.
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