Now, let's watch and see how the Democrat playbook runs now that they can institute any policy or tax increase with a veto-proof majority. New Governor, Gavin Newsome, will lead the charge and is clearly vying for a POTUS run in the future. To me, the next two years will highlight to the country what the Dems want to accomplish nationally (as goes CA goes the Dems...). Perhaps we will see practical solutions to immigration, gun control, healthcare, social programs, etc....perhaps we will see the opposite.
Gavin was the nice guy caught dating a 19-yr old and providing alcohol then had an affair with the wife of his campaign manager (and best friend) when we was married. Not that anyone, particularly in CA, gives a crap. Better than a 'family values' Republican doing the same since the Dems don't ascribe to the 'family values' concept and Republicans don't actually practice 'family values'. I only mention Newsome's history because I think he's a complete douchebag as a person and we'll see him eventually running for POTUS - not Trump level of douchebaggery for sure. I've learned to be very comfortable with Moonbeam over the years but he's had to fight the liberal legislature and I don't believe Newsome has the chops.
I voted for Feinstein - who looks like a voice of reason and moderation these days in the state. So, will Gavin and the legislature guide more towards the middle and govern closer to Governor Moonbeam or will CA fall off the left coast continental shelf driving taxes even higher and policies farther left? Will be interesting to watch but I, for one, am not optimistic. Watching what topics the legislature are willing to debate is scary enough, and some get through the process and concern me: prison reform, social programs, gas taxes, 'bullet train to nowhere', housing regulation, pension reform (or lack thereof) etc etc.
The company I work for are leveraging AI to ingest and structure news and government filing information from over 300,000 sources on a 24x7 basis and structure the data and sell material event triggers to Wall Street correlated to assets. One asset class we monitor are municipal bonds - there are about 2 million active bonds in the US at any point in time across about 60,000 Obligors of debt. We track every single one of them and correlate material news down to the CUSIP of a bond - meaning that all day long I'm watching what is happening across Propositions and Municipalities and the effect on bonds. We track by geo and sector (hospitals, schools, etc) and CA is pretty scary when you see the details on what's actually happening. We also track public and private companies and signals that effect a P&L. This insight makes me far less comfortable about CA than I might be otherwise.
For me, my wife is now officially domiciled in AZ and I'll do the same this summer as our youngest will graduate HS and head out into life. I'll enjoy watching CA from afar since I'm in the fortunate position to be in the highest income tax bracket and pay huge property taxes because we own a few properties here (and a sailboat for which we pay property tax both on the boat and for the slip space we rent from the City of Long Beach).
Here's one little sign of the differences between CA and AZ -- my wife recently bought a used car, drove it to Tucson to register it because they don't collect sales tax on used car registrations and you can register the vehicle for two yrs at half the cost of CA. We'll also move the boat down to the Sea of Cortez and avoid $4800 in property tax.
CA won't miss my income taxes or property taxes what with Hollywood and Silicon Valley incomes at play, atleast for those who haven't played the loopholes.
Trump certainly fucked us on the property tax deduction cap (Thanks Trump!) but there's always a way to deal with that.
And, my apologies to AZ as us moderate Californians become liberal Arizonans (in relative terms). Too late now, we're comin'...
https://thehill.com/...a-state-senate-after
Gavin was the nice guy caught dating a 19-yr old and providing alcohol then had an affair with the wife of his campaign manager (and best friend) when we was married. Not that anyone, particularly in CA, gives a crap. Better than a 'family values' Republican doing the same since the Dems don't ascribe to the 'family values' concept and Republicans don't actually practice 'family values'. I only mention Newsome's history because I think he's a complete douchebag as a person and we'll see him eventually running for POTUS - not Trump level of douchebaggery for sure. I've learned to be very comfortable with Moonbeam over the years but he's had to fight the liberal legislature and I don't believe Newsome has the chops.
I voted for Feinstein - who looks like a voice of reason and moderation these days in the state. So, will Gavin and the legislature guide more towards the middle and govern closer to Governor Moonbeam or will CA fall off the left coast continental shelf driving taxes even higher and policies farther left? Will be interesting to watch but I, for one, am not optimistic. Watching what topics the legislature are willing to debate is scary enough, and some get through the process and concern me: prison reform, social programs, gas taxes, 'bullet train to nowhere', housing regulation, pension reform (or lack thereof) etc etc.
The company I work for are leveraging AI to ingest and structure news and government filing information from over 300,000 sources on a 24x7 basis and structure the data and sell material event triggers to Wall Street correlated to assets. One asset class we monitor are municipal bonds - there are about 2 million active bonds in the US at any point in time across about 60,000 Obligors of debt. We track every single one of them and correlate material news down to the CUSIP of a bond - meaning that all day long I'm watching what is happening across Propositions and Municipalities and the effect on bonds. We track by geo and sector (hospitals, schools, etc) and CA is pretty scary when you see the details on what's actually happening. We also track public and private companies and signals that effect a P&L. This insight makes me far less comfortable about CA than I might be otherwise.
For me, my wife is now officially domiciled in AZ and I'll do the same this summer as our youngest will graduate HS and head out into life. I'll enjoy watching CA from afar since I'm in the fortunate position to be in the highest income tax bracket and pay huge property taxes because we own a few properties here (and a sailboat for which we pay property tax both on the boat and for the slip space we rent from the City of Long Beach).
Here's one little sign of the differences between CA and AZ -- my wife recently bought a used car, drove it to Tucson to register it because they don't collect sales tax on used car registrations and you can register the vehicle for two yrs at half the cost of CA. We'll also move the boat down to the Sea of Cortez and avoid $4800 in property tax.
CA won't miss my income taxes or property taxes what with Hollywood and Silicon Valley incomes at play, atleast for those who haven't played the loopholes.
Trump certainly fucked us on the property tax deduction cap (Thanks Trump!) but there's always a way to deal with that.
And, my apologies to AZ as us moderate Californians become liberal Arizonans (in relative terms). Too late now, we're comin'...
https://thehill.com/...a-state-senate-after