Comments on: A Bet I Wont Take

By: Steve Verdon

Steve Verdon — Tue, 05 Sep 2006 16:51:32 +0000

What it ‘proves’ is that the supposedly crushing burden can’t be all that bad if California’s GDP exceeds the rest of the country. Derrr.

And who said that GDP growth had to be negative, or that it had to be less than the rest of the country's? Boring old guys who are concerned about logic call this a red herrring. Derrrr.

By: M1EK

M1EK — Sun, 03 Sep 2006 15:18:33 +0000

Steve,

What it 'proves' is that the supposedly crushing burden can't be all that bad if California's GDP exceeds the rest of the country. Derrr.

By: Steve Verdon

Steve Verdon — Sat, 02 Sep 2006 22:47:23 +0000

The inconvenient truth for the polluter-lovers in all of this is, as people have pointed out in Drum’s comments, that despite the already existing and presumed crushing burden of environmental and other regulation, California’s GDP growth EXCEEDED that of the rest of the country for the last (quite a while).

And this proves what? Nowhere is there the claim that environmental regulations have to result in only non-positive growth.

Your goal post moving is duly noted.

By: M1EK

M1EK — Sat, 02 Sep 2006 14:17:49 +0000

The inconvenient truth for the polluter-lovers in all of this is, as people have pointed out in Drum's comments, that despite the already existing and presumed crushing burden of environmental and other regulation, California's GDP growth EXCEEDED that of the rest of the country for the last (quite a while).

By: Mark Jaquith

Mark Jaquith — Sat, 02 Sep 2006 08:44:57 +0000

It makes sense, but there's likely no way to prove it. There are too many variables in the equation, and no one will ever be able to conclusively state that cause X was responsible for Y damage. At best, you can label it a "contributing factor" and both sides will spin the level of contribution in their favor.

By: geezer

geezer — Sat, 02 Sep 2006 00:22:29 +0000

Driving undesirable business out of Kali to attain a greener economy would seem to be the whole point here. Theoretically, the libs pushing for it won't lose any sleep if companies decide to relocate. Realistically, they may wind up with a lot less of "other people's money" to spend on their pet dreams.

Almost sounds like G. Davis is still governor.

By: Jim

Jim — Fri, 01 Sep 2006 23:12:47 +0000

A week or two ago the New York Times did a profile on one of the old Oregon lumber towns. As eniviromental regulations became more stringent, the mills gradually closed. One of the refrains from the time is that such activities such as enviromental tourism would offset the job loss. In the article, the town has never recovered and has a mininum wage economy for those who have jobs (P.S. Walmart is nowehere to be found in the area). Just an interesting thought.

http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F70E13F63E5A0C738EDDA10894DE404482

By: The Unalienable Right » California governor signs law that will have no effect on global warming

Fri, 01 Sep 2006 22:28:31 +0000

[...] More: Outside the Beltway posted by: The Editors @ 12:14 pm September 1, 2006 [...]

By: the Pirate

the Pirate — Fri, 01 Sep 2006 21:57:00 +0000

Oh and for the inevitable, new grad, more student approach... We don't have enough students in the civil/environmental engineering field and retention of those student to a degree isn't the best (a often discussed topic in the engineering education community) and the demand is so great for them, many students at Universities I have been associated with around here have students getting job offers and signing bonuses up to a year before they graduate. More job opportunities just makes it harder on recruiters and drives up what those grads will cost.

By: Wayne

Wayne — Fri, 01 Sep 2006 21:53:58 +0000

I think justanotherjohn has a good starting point. Such things as rolling blackouts, shortages of resources, population growth and prices for a given product compare to other states can be indicators as will.

By: the Pirate

the Pirate — Fri, 01 Sep 2006 21:52:50 +0000

My question is who is going to fill these "new jobs"? I work in the environmental engineering business here in California and I see the same thing happening at almost every pubic agency & private consultants, there is a lot of work to be done, a lot of jobs available and not enough people to fill the open positions. Great it may create new environmental jobs, but who is going to fill them (other than people like me for a "nice" pay raise)?

By: Michael

Michael — Fri, 01 Sep 2006 20:59:06 +0000

Just to clarify, I'm not arguing with the fact that raising the cost of doing business in California will create job loss. I'm arguing with the idea of calculating the loss of something you don't know you were ever going to have.

By: Michael

Michael — Fri, 01 Sep 2006 20:57:15 +0000

While we're speculating at the possible future revenue the state will no longer get, why not continue the speculation about all the new jobs created by non-polluting companies who do move to California because it has been cleaned up and people with talent are moving back there.

Yeah, it's a stretch, but so it calculating economic costs based on things that may or may not have happened one way or the other.

By: yetanotherjohn

yetanotherjohn — Fri, 01 Sep 2006 20:54:32 +0000

Wouldn't a reasonable way to measure the "opportunity cost" of the measure be to compare California to the national and neighboring states economies (Jobs created, population emigration/immigration, state GDP, etc) and see if they go up or down relative to each other? While this would not be an absolute because other factors could impact the business other than this law, it would be a reasonable starting place. An example of 'other factors' would be if the world suddenly decided that it wanted twice as much or half the Hollywood product, I suspect that would also have a huge impact on the state. You could also measure across industry trends. If a segment of business grows nationally, but stays flat or declines in California, that would be an indication of the laws impact. That would also help to identify the "1,000 less jobs in California" if the industries most impacted don't keep up with the national trends. As an example, if I remember correctly, California and the rest of the Northwest had several Aluminum smelting plants shut down because they were large electricity users during the shortage. I think they even found it more cost effective to get paid by the power plants to shut down and thus keep the workers on the payroll, but idle. If this measure would increase electricity costs, then this industry would likely be one of the canaries in the mine.

By: » Gone Hollywood

» Gone Hollywood — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

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