Originally Posted by Crawford (Post 8747075)

Except no one blamed high housing values and homeless on Trump. And CA has had high housing prices and homeless for the last 40 years, at least. CA has probably always had more "street people" given the climate.

Originally Posted by Sun Belt (Post 8747101)

You're being disingenuous. The homeless epidemic has not been around for 40 years.

Originally Posted by craigs (Post 8746597)

Disagreed--how is that true?

Originally Posted by IrishIllini (Post 8747520)

Welfare programs aren’t rife with abuse. Qualifying for programs entails completing paperwork and interviews with multiple bureaucracies. The identified cases of abuse, fraud, or waste are minimal.

Originally Posted by Sun Belt (Post 8747097)

This is the reality in California. There are currently 6 million seniors in the state. By 2030 there will be 9 million. Over 20% of the population will be over 66 years of age -- more than Florida -- yet not nearly as affordable as low cost, low tax Florida.

Originally Posted by Sun Belt (Post 8747097)

These realities are not a good thing in the long term:

1] Net negative domestic growth
2] Slowing international growth
3] Natural increase in decline

Originally Posted by Obadno (Post 8747193)

The issues in California have nothing to do with Trump, you seriously think the SALT deduction changes that went into effect a year ago are causing the issue?

California has had domestic out migration for 7 years running. Presidents are not nearly as important as you seem to think. Whatever issues you think California may or may not have they have absolutely nothing to do with current policy changes which have had almost no time to even go into effect, and they have almost nothing to do with National political policy in general.

Almost all of the real impact on your life is from local politicians and politics, not federal unless its war. I cant imagine how much of a blessing it is for incompetent state governments to know the average dreg blames their failures on DC. What a godsend for them.

Additionally: why should you be allowed to offset expensive state tax on federal taxes? That just allows high tax states to hide the true burden of their cost in the federal budget. It should be removed as a deduction entirely.

Thats another argument however :cheers:

Whataboutism argument: RED STATES GET MORE FEDERAL AID

***Despite that being disingenuous because rural western states have more federally owned property in than costal states via BLM and massive subsidies due to the outdated and horrible Farm Subsidy system as well as Native American Communities, not to mention that southern states have lots of poor so they get more federal aid due to welfare support (You dont hate the poor do you????)***

Id agree that most federal support should be ended and in these areas, Id also like to see the millions of square miles of land the federal government arbitrarily holds in the west turned back over to the states and citizens of the west. and I would like to see a total reformation of the welfare system that is rife with abuse.

Originally Posted by badrunner (Post 8747639)

Isn't it great news then, that a lot of those old people will be leaving California for cheaper retirement destinations? :shrug:

Originally Posted by craigs (Post 8747664)

Please explain how these are 'not good things.'

As they work slow California's population growth while we struggle to solve problems exacerbated by population growth, like spiraling housing costs, I think these are good things. I think adding more people faster would make our problems worse.

But let's see your argument for why California would be better off with hundreds of thousands of additional residents than we already have right now, or why we would be better off in the future if we grew even faster than we would without net domestic out-migration.


That isn't a problem caused by state policy. It's a demographic issue playing out across the entire Western world, and I'm not sure what can be done about it. But I'm sure you've got a GOP partisan talking point on hand for this, right? So knock yourself out--please feel free to use this thread to decisively solve the problems of aging.


Obadno, I will ask you again: why did you assert "Domestic out-migration is not a good sign for Californians future"?

Please explain how would we be better off, and be better able to solve growth-related problems like spiraling housing costs, if we kept adding more people faster and faster, while nobody moves out?

Originally Posted by toddguy (Post 8747054)

Dallas/Fort Worth. already over 7 million, can sprawl in every direction, high enough to not have to worry about rising sea levels, too far inland to get the worst effects of hurricanes.
Dallas seems to have everything going for it.

Originally Posted by craigs (Post 8746597)

Disagreed--how is that true? Given the state's current problems, I'd say domestic out-migration is more likely a good thing than a bad thing right now.

California sent 691,000 people to other states in 2018 and received 501,000 people from other states in 2018, for a net domestic out-migration amounting to less than 0.5% of the state's total population. Yet California continues to grow via natural increase and international immigration, adding 6.2%, or roughly 2,303,089 people, to its total population between 2010 and 2018.

What if we didn't experience net domestic out-migration during that time frame? The population would have grown roughly a half a percent faster in 2018 alone, and cumulatively over this decade, we'd have hundreds of thousands more Californians than we do right now.

How would it be an improvement to add hundreds of thousands more Californians to the current population, clogging up the roads and increasing pollution, competing with the rest of us (and with all the kids growing up, and with foreign immigrants) for housing, employment, educational resources, mental health and homeless services, etc.? It wouldn't be.

No, that even more crowded and competitive scenario would be worse than the one we face today, not better. So why the hand-wringing and phony assertions to the contrary? Why the assertion that whatever is happening in California is necessarily bad and negative and destructive? Hmm....


That's the correct answer!

The orchestrated campaign to deride, denounce, and derail California for its political sins by the Trump regime, its partisans and culture warriors, and their propaganda outlet Fox is the reason we're getting all this phony 'concern trolling' over Californians' well-being right now. Oh, they have not one iota of actual concern for us--but they've got the trolling down pat. And it is that Trumpian crusade against California that creates the larger context in which this forum's anti-California threads are understood by locals.

Originally Posted by Crawford (Post 8747075)

People are correctly pointing out that Dotard frequently cites California as a "disaster" when it's plausibly the most successful geography on the planet. At the very least, it's unquestionably the most innovative place on the planet.

Originally Posted by LA21st (Post 8747763)

What's even more hilarous is THEY THINK people in Dallas and Houston won't care about adding millions of people and love the traffic (who knows why) because THEY DESPERATELY WANT TO BELIEVE IT. Get out of here with that nonsense. One or two hardly used light rail lines won't change this.

We'll see what really happens though. My money is on they will get fed up like anywhere else as their commutes become even more hellish.

Originally Posted by badrunner (Post 8747859)

Texas Cities and Counties Scramble to Increase Property Taxes Before New Law Takes Effect

It's already starting to happen. A lot of Texas homeowners got sticker shock on their property taxes this year, especially in the Dallas area which is already relatively high cost for the state. At least they passed a law similar to prop 13 which should help homeowners down the line, but maybe it'll create some of the same problems and market imbalances that prop 13 did in California?

We'll see if Texas manages growth better than California did. Maybe in 30 years Texas will have 50 million people and Fox News will be running apocalyptic news stories about how too many people and liberal policies have ruined Texas :haha:

Originally Posted by JManc (Post 8747783)

Except for the Cowboys...

Originally Posted by JManc (Post 8747878)

Not just Dallas but Houston and especially Austin. Our property taxes are atrocious. They've been trickling in the mail this past week and they'll be higher this year. I also own land in CA, not a lot but dig the low tax rate.

Originally Posted by Crawford (Post 8747147)

Of course it has. I remember Market Street/Tenderloin decades ago. It was 100x worse than now, with homeless encampments everywhere, dudes bathing in the fountains. Market Street was a toilet. As a small child, my eyes were bugging out at the sordid scene.

But back then we didn't have maniacs in the WH lying about everything to their Jonestown cult.

Originally Posted by bossabreezes (Post 8748156)

The Tenderloin is literally all of this still, and more. Imagine this, needles everywhere, people OD'ing in cars, and feces. I'm pretty sure it's at it's lowest point ever. Just saying. Definitely saw a dead guy on Market towards Embarcardero with a needle jammed in his arm this May.

Not just on the streets either. I had to use the restroom in the Westfield Mall and found someone slumped over, face down towards the urinal, arm tied off and all. Had to get the security guard. It's really, really rough around there nowadays.