calwatcher

California's Labor Market in Trouble as Unemployment Rate Soars

Nice tight article.
California is now ripe for an adjustment that should have happened years ago. Home values in many California communities, especially those close to water, have been beyond the reach of 80 percent of the residents for years. That may finally change, and it should.
In sum, the state has a laundry list of vices: too many people working too few hours with too many entitlements as they borrow too much money with too few assets and no savings.
Illegal immigration is one of the only bright spots in the state's economic outlook. Where else can you get hundreds of thousands of people to pay taxes and not claim any benefits? And please don't think native Californians are willing to do those jobs that immigrants do, not when it is so easy to suckle the government tit.
Californians have become specialists at milking disability, unemployment and any other state handout program. Employees cost more than in any other state in the union. Most Californians can quote you the phone number of a personal injury lawyer! Good marketing meets a market that would rather get in a car accident and sue than go to work.
California needs to look at why places like Utah are faring much better during the economic downturn. It is by doing a lot of the things that made the US such a great place to put a business in the first place.
And let out of prison the 100,000 or so non-violent drug offenders that the state currently pays about $47,000 each to house and feed. This is no time to pour billions down a money shredder known as the drug war.
The reality is the most businesses are looking at how to get the hell out of California before its economy falls into the ocean.
Others with some liquidity are thinking that 2009 and 2010 may be a good time to look for that second residence in San Diego.
The bright side is that you've got one of the sharpest governors in the US. Still, Californians are not the best at gulping hard and swallowing a bitter pill, even when they can see it is only going to get bigger and more bitter.