Budget and Finance

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Pension Debt Vastly Understated

OCT. 20, 2010 By DAVE ROBERTS The Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) is considering changing the rules for government pension reporting to better reflect the financial status of the plans, but critics say the proposed changes don’t go far enough

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How Not To Fix A Broken State

OCT. 19, 2010 This book review was first published in City Journal. By STEVEN GREENHUT California Crackup: How Reform Broke The Golden State And How We Can Fix It, by Joe Mathews and Mark Paul (University of California Press, 240

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Pension Funds' Odd Incentives

OCT. 12, 2010 By DAVE ROBERTS Billionaire investor Warren Buffett has compared investing in the stock market to gambling in a casino. He criticizes the large volume of daily trading and minute-to-minute tracking of the ups and downs of various

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Few Solutions To Pension Mess

OCT. 11, 2010 It has become almost impossible to exaggerate the depth of the state’s pension scandals, as more details emerge not only about the city of Bell, but about common abuses in other burgs. A new report produced by

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The Grimes Poll

OCT. 8, 2010 A friend and I have a bet about this election cycle. He says that voters are lazy, dumb and selfish and will reelect Jerry Brown and Barbara Boxer. Being an eternal optimist, I disagree. I think that

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Study Says Public Pay Out Of Line

OCT. 5, 2010 A new California think tank is releasing a new study Wednesday on reforming public employee pay and pensions. We reprint the entire study here today with permission from the California Center for Public Policy. CALIFORNIA CENTER FOR

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More Fixes Won't Fix Things

SEPT. 27, 2010 It’s easy to conclude that California may become, as former state librarian Kevin Starr put it, a “failed state.” It’s just too big, unruly and diverse to be effectively governed, commentators frequently say. Californians are also said

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Lawmakers Like Prop 25

SEPT. 27, 2010 By KATY GRIMES Proposition 25 has many of the state’s legislators up in arms, but for very different reasons. Some fear losing the two-thirds vote threshold on budgets and taxes, while others fear the initiative process is

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When Is A Tax Just A Tax?

SEPT. 24, 2010 By KATY GRIMES When is a tax just a tax, and a fee just a fee? A November ballot initiative seeks to answer the question by defining both a tax and a fee, and then require both the

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Officials Hid Size Of Pension Crisis

SEPT. 22, 2010 By DAVE ROBERTS Due to “Alice in Wonderland” accounting methods, the amount that taxpayers owe to provide pensions for local and state government employees is much larger – perhaps an extra $2.5 trillion – than government officials

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