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Old 10-06-2013, 08:29 PM
 
4,794 posts, read 12,348,865 times
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California

This above article is so packed full of the devastating statistics of the decline of the middle class in California due mostly to liberal oligarchs and their policies that I can only summarize a few highlights, or lowlights.
This won't be pleasant for the see no evil/hear no evil/ speak no evil monkeys that inhabit city data.

- In 2011 the state was home to 90 billionaires, 20 more than second place New York and more than twice as many as booming Texas.
and yet...
-At the same time, the Golden State now suffers the highest level of poverty in the country—23.5 percent compared to 16 percent nationally—worse than long-term hard luck cases like Mississippi.

-Like medieval serfs, increasing numbers of Californians are downwardly mobile, and doing worse than their parents: native born Latinos actually have shorter lifespans than their parents, according to one recent report.

-Once you get outside the Bay Area, unemployment in many of the state’s largest counties—Sacramento, Los Angeles, Riverside, San Bernardino, Fresno, and Oakland—soars into the double digits. Indeed, among the 20 American cities with the highest unemployment rates, a remarkable 11 are in California, led by Merced’s mind-boggling 22 percent rate.

- Since the recession, California remains down something like 500,000 jobs, a 3.5 percent loss, while its Lone Star rival has boosted its employment by a remarkable 931,000, a gain of more than 9 percent.

- California’s once widely admired public schools were recently ranked near the absolute bottom in the country. Think about this: despite the state’s huge tech sector, California eighth graders scored 47th out of the 50 states in science testing

-As in medieval times, land ownership, particularly along the coast, has become increasingly difficult for those not in the upper class. 39 percent of working households in the Los Angeles metropolitan area spend more than half their income on housing, as do 35 percent in the San Francisco metro area—both higher than 31 percent in the New York area and well above the national rate of 24 percent. This feudalizing trend is likely to worsen due to draconian land regulations that will put the remaining stock of single family houses ever further out of reach, something that seems related to a reduction in child-bearing in the state.

So while you whistle past the graveyard cheering on your silly triumphalism of the past few months, your once great middle class state will continue down the road to feudalism, with you cheering it on, all the way.
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Old 10-06-2013, 08:39 PM
 
Location: Earth
17,440 posts, read 28,537,343 times
Reputation: 7477
Quote:
Originally Posted by kanhawk View Post
California

This above article is so packed full of the devastating statistics of the decline of the middle class in California due mostly to liberal oligarchs and their policies that I can only summarize a few highlights, or lowlights.
This won't be pleasant for the see no evil/hear no evil/ speak no evil monkeys that inhabit city data.

- In 2011 the state was home to 90 billionaires, 20 more than second place New York and more than twice as many as booming Texas.
and yet...
-At the same time, the Golden State now suffers the highest level of poverty in the country—23.5 percent compared to 16 percent nationally—worse than long-term hard luck cases like Mississippi.

-Like medieval serfs, increasing numbers of Californians are downwardly mobile, and doing worse than their parents: native born Latinos actually have shorter lifespans than their parents, according to one recent report.

-Once you get outside the Bay Area, unemployment in many of the state’s largest counties—Sacramento, Los Angeles, Riverside, San Bernardino, Fresno, and Oakland—soars into the double digits. Indeed, among the 20 American cities with the highest unemployment rates, a remarkable 11 are in California, led by Merced’s mind-boggling 22 percent rate.

- Since the recession, California remains down something like 500,000 jobs, a 3.5 percent loss, while its Lone Star rival has boosted its employment by a remarkable 931,000, a gain of more than 9 percent.

- California’s once widely admired public schools were recently ranked near the absolute bottom in the country. Think about this: despite the state’s huge tech sector, California eighth graders scored 47th out of the 50 states in science testing

-As in medieval times, land ownership, particularly along the coast, has become increasingly difficult for those not in the upper class. 39 percent of working households in the Los Angeles metropolitan area spend more than half their income on housing, as do 35 percent in the San Francisco metro area—both higher than 31 percent in the New York area and well above the national rate of 24 percent. This feudalizing trend is likely to worsen due to draconian land regulations that will put the remaining stock of single family houses ever further out of reach, something that seems related to a reduction in child-bearing in the state.

So while you whistle past the graveyard cheering on your silly triumphalism of the past few months, your once great middle class state will continue down the road to feudalism, with you cheering it on, all the way.
In large part due to Prop 13, although Kotkin probably would not agree. Prop 13 created an hereditary feudal aristocracy in California, as former Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens predicted it would.
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Old 10-06-2013, 09:05 PM
 
11 posts, read 26,313 times
Reputation: 74
The trouble is that all states look like this. If you think the rich in Florida shower the poor with love, you've got another thing commin'..

In Texas you can bet your country ass that the rich could care less about the poor.

The only states tht I can imagine may have an enlightened enough philospical framework to understand poverty are New York and California. The rest of them simply do not care.

So why don't we look at Mississippis rich. I can tell you for certain they believe the lower classes were born that way for a reason. That was the Souths main driver and still shared by some of its elete. What is the graduation rate of blacks in that state vs CA? What is their income?

California is but one of 50 states dealing with a significantly stratified economic reward system.
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Old 10-06-2013, 09:49 PM
 
30,876 posts, read 36,854,288 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Vncks View Post
The trouble is that all states look like this. If you think the rich in Florida shower the poor with love, you've got another thing commin'..

In Texas you can bet your country ass that the rich could care less about the poor.

The only states tht I can imagine may have an enlightened enough philospical framework to understand poverty are New York and California. The rest of them simply do not care.

So why don't we look at Mississippis rich. I can tell you for certain they believe the lower classes were born that way for a reason. That was the Souths main driver and still shared by some of its elete. What is the graduation rate of blacks in that state vs CA? What is their income?

California is but one of 50 states dealing with a significantly stratified economic reward system.
California pretends to care, but it totally contradicts itself with its policies. What good is caring if what you're doing is not helping?
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Old 10-07-2013, 02:47 AM
 
Location: Oroville, California
3,477 posts, read 6,486,816 times
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Actually, Merced's unemployment rate is 14.4% as of July. Bad, but the Central Valley counties have always had high unemployment rates (have lived in Stanislaus, Merced and Fresno counties for about twenty years of my life). Still, there seems to be a much more pronounced underclass there now than when I was young. The population keeps growing at a very fast rate too so it seems improvements in employment, wages, poverty, etc... are constantly being offset by the ever growing pool of unskilled/semi-skilled labor.
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Old 10-07-2013, 03:48 AM
 
11 posts, read 26,313 times
Reputation: 74
Quote:
Originally Posted by mysticaltyger View Post
California pretends to care, but it totally contradicts itself with its policies. What good is caring if what you're doing is not helping?
I don't know enough about the particulars to say. I do know this is a national problem. It seems to me Brown has decided to shift educational dollars toward to bottom and Time will tell if that's helpful.

This article should have been done on a national scale. It's kind of like picking on one small area.
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Old 10-07-2013, 06:33 AM
 
7,150 posts, read 10,866,083 times
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One can look at the world as Joel Kotkin does ...
or one can look at the world as David Attenborough does:
What A Wonderful World With David Attenborough -- BBC One [FULL HD] - YouTube

I'm with Atenborough.
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Old 10-07-2013, 07:26 AM
 
Location: Wherever I happen to be at the moment
1,228 posts, read 1,366,081 times
Reputation: 1836
Quote:
Originally Posted by nullgeo View Post
One can look at the world as Joel Kotkin does ...
or one can look at the world as David Attenborough does:
What A Wonderful World With David Attenborough -- BBC One [FULL HD] - YouTube

I'm with Atenborough.
So am I. But you and I are among the lucky ones. Granted, it wasn't really luck but hard work and good planning. Nevertheless, we own our homes, have reasonable incomes, live below our means and don't have a great deal of pressures and worries on us. Unfortunately an increasing number are not so favorably situated and those ranks appear to be growing.

While the world is decidedly a wondrous and beautiful place to be, I'm not so smug as to believe that it couldn't come crashing down on me due to a major medical issue or some other unforeseen catastrophe whether natural or manmade.
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Old 10-07-2013, 07:40 AM
 
7,150 posts, read 10,866,083 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ghostly1 View Post
So am I. But you and I are among the lucky ones. Granted, it wasn't really luck but hard work and good planning. Nevertheless, we own our homes, have reasonable incomes, live below our means and don't have a great deal of pressures and worries on us. Unfortunately an increasing number are not so favorably situated and those ranks appear to be growing.

While the world is decidedly a wondrous and beautiful place to be, I'm not so smug as to believe that it couldn't come crashing down on me due to a major medical issue or some other unforeseen catastrophe whether natural or manmade.
You and I appear to be diametrically opposed, politically ... but I do agree with your assessment that many are less favorably situated ... though I am quite sure not many ever have been "favorably situated" in the history of the world.

Other than a short blip in western European and American time -- specifically: for roughly 50 years of post-WWII history out of hundreds of thousands of years of homo sapiens roaming the planet -- 99% of human population has lived approximately hand-to-mouth ... in the past couple thousand, where we have lived in "civilized" cultures, it has been pretty feudal and only in the past couple hundred have some people been in a position to strike out and make their claim on the world without royal connections or dispensations.

All said, the true nature of life, for all creatures and plants, is taking things as they come. Demanding or expecting security -- particularly based on ideological fantasies -- is the greatest threat to any individual's potential enjoyment and fulfillment of life. Learning to enjoy and thrive in it by the moment is the key.

Easy for me to say? You have no idea the history I have lived. As it is now, I have built assets. But I don't use hardly any of them. I live, literally, in a van and on a little boat.
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Old 10-07-2013, 07:48 AM
 
Location: Wherever I happen to be at the moment
1,228 posts, read 1,366,081 times
Reputation: 1836
Quote:
Originally Posted by nullgeo View Post
You and I appear to be diametrically opposed, politically ... but I do agree with your assessment that many are less favorably situated ... though I am quite sure not many ever have been "favorably situated" in the history of the world.

Other than a short blip in western European and American time -- specifically: for roughly 50 years of post-WWII history out of hundreds of thousands of years of homo sapiens roaming the planet -- 99% of human population has lived approximately hand-to-mouth ... in the past couple thousand, where we have lived in "civilized" cultures, it has been pretty feudal and only in the past couple hundred have some people been in a position to strike out and make their claim on the world without royal connections or dispensations.

All said, the true nature of life, for all creatures and plants, is taking things as they come. Demanding or expecting security -- particularly based on ideological fantasies -- is the greatest threat to any individual's potential enjoyment and fulfillment of life. Learning to enjoy and thrive in it by the moment is the key.

Easy for me to say? You have no idea the history I have lived. As it is now, I have built assets. But I don't use hardly any of them. I live, literally, in a van and on a little boat.
I'm aware of how you live and much of what you've been through. My life hasn't exactly been a bed of roses either. I venture to say that what separates us from those who live on the fringe is that we have choices. Many don't and, as you said, that's nothing new either historically or sociologically. Times change. Mankind not so much.

Security? Whazzat?
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