Governor Brown Gets an “F” ~ Worst Governor in the Nation

Posted by Tina

The folks over at CATO grade the nations governors on fiscal policy every year. This year they report that only Democrat governor’s received a grade of “F” and governors earning the grade of “A” were all Republicans. The governors are graded on tax policy using a “limited-government perspective.”

Those governors receiving an “A” grade include: Pat McCrory of North Carolina, Sam Brownback of Kansas, Paul LePage of Maine, and Mike Pence of Indiana.

The list of losers is longer: Mark Dayton of Minnesota, John Kitzhaber of Oregon, Jack Markell of Delaware, Jay Inslee of Washington, Pat Quinn of Illinois, Deval Patrick of Massachusetts, John Hickenlooper of Colorado, and Jerry Brown of California.

Governor Jerry Brown earned his “F” grade by increasing misery and taxes for the citizens of the state. According to CATO he “…championed a plan to increase annual tax revenues by $6 billion a year,” and “…proposed spending increases averaging 6.8 percent annually over the last three years, which is more than twice the national average of 3.1 percent over that period.”

The expansion of Medicaid under the ACA, Obamacare, cost the governor a few points as well. CATO cites the Congressional Budget office that estimates states will incur an expense of “$46 billion” for medicaid expansion over the next 10 years. I’d bet that California’s estimate should be greater.

Last but not least for low grades are the underfunded pensions. Governor Browns remedy is to shift some cost back to the districts. It might make the states books look better but what about local districts? Isn’t this just a ruse rather than a remedy? Brown is getting praise for the move, even from a few Republicans. I guess any move is better than no move at all. On the other hand, that’s how we ended up with Obamacare…we settled for a progressive (Liberal Democrat) fix to our problems.

The full report is available for download at CATO.

Unemployment and underemployment remains high in California with 1,374,184 unemployed people and a rate that is the worst in the nation:

According to the BLS current population survey (CPS), the unemployment rate for California fell 0.0 percentage points in August 2014 to 7.4%. The state unemployment rate was 1.3 percentage points higher than the national rate for the month. The unemployment rate in California peaked in February 2010 at 12.4% and is now 5.0 percentage points lower. From a post peak low of 7.4% in June 2014, the unemployment rate has now grown by 0.0 percentage points.

Chico’s last reported unemployment rate was http://www.deptofnumbers.com/unemployment/california/chico/”>still high at 8.1%. More than 8,000 of our neighbors are without jobs. I winder how many gave up looking long ago…they don’t get counted in these numbers.

There is some good news for Californians. The price of gasoline nationwide is dropping like a rock…’course, California gets the number one spot for highest gas taxes:

The American Petroleum Institute listed California’s gas taxes as second highest in the nation behind New York. After the July 1 tax increase, however, the 70.1 cents average tax per gallon will lead the nation.

If we wanted to fill that report card out even more we could include the fact that our Public school system is among the worst in the nation.

Its time for new leadership. Neel Kaskari is the wiser choice for Governor.