Posted on 11/24/2025 7:07:01 AM PST by MtnClimber
Over the weekend, we learned that the Golden State loses one taxpayer to another state every minute, and faces an $18 billion budget shortfall, which is $5 billion higher than was projected just a few months ago.
We also learned that only now, 10 months after wildfires destroyed thousands of buildings in the Los Angeles area, has the first home been rebuilt.
These stories are yet more evidence of a completely dysfunctional state captured by ideologues who couldn’t care less about the harm their policies cause. Will voters there ever learn?
The National Taxpayers Union Foundation used IRS data to calculate how many taxpayers are moving into and out of states each year.
What it found was stunning. California is losing taxpayers at a rate of one every 1 minute 44 seconds – the fastest of any state in the nation. That amounts to billions in lost tax revenue every year.
Florida, in contrast, is gaining taxpayers at a rate of one every 2 minutes 9 seconds.
Meanwhile, California’s Legislative Analyst’s Office just reported that the state faces an $18 billion shortfall next fiscal year, which is $5 billion higher than it projected a few months back and which will likely “grow to about $35 billion annually due to spending growth continuing to outstrip revenue growth.”
The report also cautions that even this outlook is optimistic because the current AI stock bubble is masking the state’s dire fiscal situation. California is ridiculously dependent on capital gains taxes. “With so much enthusiasm surrounding AI, it now appears time to take seriously the notion that the stock market has become overheated,” it warns.
The report calls the state’s budget position “weak,” which has to be the understatement of the year.
Next, we come to the weekend story in the Los Angeles Times to find that “The first home has been rebuilt in the wake of the Palisades Fire.”
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass calls it “an important moment of hope.”
It is anything but that. As the Times itself notes, the Palisades fire destroyed nearly 7,000 buildings, but 10 months later, only 2,000 building permits have been issued and only 340 projects are under construction.
In Atladena, the site of the other massively destructive wildfire in January that claimed some 6,500 buildings, the first home that managed to get an occupancy permit last week was a garage that had been converted into 640-foot “accessory dwelling unit.”
Meanwhile, more than 70% of the Palisades fire victims still live in temporary housing, as are 67% of the victims of the Altadena fires.
Most of them have little hope of ever returning, or seeing their communities rebuilt.
In a separate report, the Los Angeles Times notes that the five most destructive fires from 2017 to 2020 “burned down 22,500 houses.”
But even now, five to eight years later, “just 8,400 — 38% — have been rebuilt.” And “wealthier, flat, suburban areas have tended to rebuild faster than poorer, hilly, rural areas.”
It’s no wonder so many Californians are calling it quits and moving to states that don’t treat them like serfs.
But questions, which were posed in these pages recently, remain: Why do those who don’t or can’t leave put up with it? Why do they keep electing the same cast of criminals who are stealing their money and ruining their state?
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They vote the same way every election and always expect a different outcome.
The fact that they're leaving suggests they have learned they don't like what they're experiencing.
The problem obviously is so many don't associate their voting history with the results they're experiencing. Like a horde of locusts moving along, leaving devastation in their wake.
Question: Do the owners of the burnt down homes in the Palisades get a revised lower property tax bill? If not, it would be a no brainer to sell the lot to a hedge fund and say bye bye CA.
Deep State doesn’t care.
Wanna save your state, California?
Run MAGA candidates for every office, in every primary.
And secure your damned elections.
It’s easier for ‘em to just move and suck up the fruits of the states that put in the hard work to make sure they didn’t turn in to sht holes like california.
Quite the exodus, Nation-Wide.
The cancer will just spread. These people will bring their Socialist VOTING RECORDS with them, and they usually don’t turn into Conservatives overnight.
They’ll just move to a lesser Socialist Enclave from the one they came from and continue to ruin it further.
‘The People’s Republic of Madistan’ (WI) comes immediately to mind. :(
I’m seeing my own California neighborhood clearing out - for Florida, Texas and Tennessee.
Homes are being bought up for cash by corporations who drop two or three ADU’s on the property - and voila, now they’re all rentals... very expensive rentals.
2019, retired, left San Diego 30 years after arriving from Dallas. Crossing back over the Colorado River at Yuma was a great feeling.
Look for the “Leave California Tax” to rise exponentially as the exodus continues. The funny thing is that Covid chaos and its “remote work” policies are the great destroyer of centrally located workplaces. That which they wished for is that which they got. Good and hard, too.
It will really be interesting to see how Gavin Newsom runs for president on his record in California. The state is a disaster due to both him and the years of Democrat rule who came before him. All the way into the early 1990s, it was the Golden State. And the Dems destroyed it. Now anyone who makes money is fleeing and they will be left with a bunch of people with their hands out for government payments that cannot be funded.
“They vote the same way every election and always expect a different outcome.”
They may not even expect a different outcome. Their hatred is stronger than their common sense.
Doesn’t matter, all that matters is that “D” next to the name.
That’s why Kamala still almost one. And if Newsom is marginally better, he wins.
The voters have learned.
The majority are takers and eaters and leeches. They vote to take.
The producers are fleeing.
That’s why Kamala still almost one.
Article once again makes the huge assumption that California's election totals represent an accurate canvass of ballots cast.
“...and voila, now they’re all rentals... very expensive rentals”
That’s the best solution. I bet they fill up.
Yes they do and they get to keep the old rate if they rebuild. If they are long time residents, they probably don't have much of a property tax bill anyway. The problem is people may not be able to afford to wait for a new house to be rebuilt and the cost of bringing it up to current code.
It’s no wonder so many Californians are calling it quits
and moving to states that don’t treat them like serfs.
++++++++++
The question becomes can they help the new locations
to maintain a liveable location for others as they keep
coming in? Huminoids are consumers and at times don’t
help keep up with the needs of others. Three score and
ten then move on down the line with some type after death
process. At least cremation reduces space needs some.
It looks like people are leaving the most crowded places, including my state. I’m fine with this.
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