At Last, California Ties Texas

Wayne Lusvardi:

It seems that, since 2006 when the University of Texas Longhorns football team beat USC in the Rose Bowl 41-38 for the National Championship of college football, California hasn’t been able to beat or even tie Texas at anything.

Richard Rider, head of San Diego Tax Fighters, has recently compiled a mostly depressing list of how California stacks up with other states in economic and regulatory performance.

But I have good news to tell you. California has at last tied the State of Texas in something.  California has tied Texas, along with Hawaii and Florida, with an “F” grade in property and casualty insurance regulation, according to a new study released by the Heartland Institute.

The study conducted by Eli Lehrer ranked state insurance regulations according to their degree of politicization, degree of clarity, availability of auto and homeowner’s insurance to the uninsured, market competition, rate setting flexibility, credit scoring and territorial rating.

Vermont and Ohio had the best property and casualty insurance ranking for 2010.  California, Texas, Florida and Hawaii had the worst grade — “F” — based on scores two or more standard statistical deviations below the average score.  Two standard deviations is a statistical term meaning you are not even in the ballpark, let alone in the game.  The only area where California got a passing grade was auto and homeowner insurance competition.

Baseball Mimics the Economy

As of the writing of this article, the Texas Rangers professional baseball team was leading the American League Western Division with a record of 47 wins and 41 losses, for a .534 winning percentage.  The Rangers held a one-game lead over the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim

The Los Angeles Dodgers were in last place in the National League West Division, with 37 wins and 51 losses, for a .420 winning percentage, buried 12 games out of contention.

The Rangers ranked eighth in Major League Baseball attendance with 1,631,723 attendees through 44 games, while the Dodgers were ranked tenth with 1,639,952 attendees through 45 games.   The Dodgers were also mired in bankruptcy.

Ironically, the Dodgers had the highest ranked operating income of all major league baseball teams for 2010, according to Forbes magazine. The Texas Rangers were unranked. California still can’t win for losing.

A July 5th opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal, “The Rise and Needless Decline of the Golden State” by John Steele Gordon, reported that more people left California than arrived in the last decade.

As famous New York Yankee baseball star Yogi Berra once put it: “If people don’t want to come out to the ballpark, how are you going to stop them?”

July 8, 2011