Grow our economy, which will benefit everyone, we need to be practical about creating jobs.
Stop enacting new job-killing laws and regulations.
Sunset existing laws and regulations that affect California’s economy. For those that are unfunded right now, kill them right now. For others, eliminate them over a 3 year period. If they are that important to survive, let a future legislature debate and vote them in again.
Loosen rules to give employees and employers more freedom when appropriate. For example, employees in semi-professional positions should be able to choose when they take breaks and at what point over-time kicks in (after 8 hours a day or 40 hours a week). Employers should be able to request that those same employees modify their schedules when conditions warrant, without risk of not being subject to fines and attorney fees for minor adjustments.
Hold employers up high. Our economy and workplace is very complex and intertwines with a myriad of federal and local agencies. Before supporting one cause over another, examine how local employers may be affected.
Improve education. Here is a path that leads to a better workforce and the next generation of innovators and job creators:
We must have a K-12 curriculum that emphasizes skill-building, communication and reasoning in math and science. Higher education needs to de-emphasize “social justice” and other degrees that have no connection to the economic realities of individuals being self-sustaining.
For those that simply are not inclined to go to a university or college, they still have to have curriculum for that leads to having a marketable skill, whether it be farming, or one of the traditional trades that provide services and products that people buy.
The public education system must be robust and highly functional. The system needs to be able to purge personnel that are not fit to manage classrooms and teach the skills necessary for students to succeed.
Make California financially stable:
Kill projects like high speed rail. New costs estimates are over $98 billion. Borrowing costs are estimated to be $10 billion a year. The ridership estimates used to rationalize the project are equal to California’s population and ticket prices at half at what other systems around the world charge and they use a 50% operating margin when not one system in the world does better than break even, and most are at a loss.
Stop funding entities that do not realistically lead to economic sustenance for state or individual citizens. Our state schools have grown exponentially, but are graduating students with majors that have no connection to being able to get a job. We are investing billions of dollars annually in a system that has no return to the students or state. This has to stop.
Significant pension reform must occur for government employees. Like the old General Motors, the state’s finances are dominated by pension liabilities because of poor design and planning. Future beneficiaries are going to have to pay more in contributions and time served, both more in line with the private sector, in order to have checks in retirement.
Prudence. California must establish a rainy-day fund and not implement big programs in good times that cannot sustain themselves in economic declines.