But two years later, however, Schwarzenegger — in full legacy-hunt mode — didn’t say squat when the California Air Resources Board released a “scoping” plan of the economic impact of AB 32 that was full of happy talk that depicted the law as akin to a job-creation program.

Professional economists pushed back. The “peer review” of the findings was harsh. The panel included Harvard’s Robert Stavins — perhaps the world’s leading environmental economist. Stavins backed AB 32 but considered its happy talk ridiculous. “I have come to the inescapable conclusion that the economic analysis is terribly deficient in critical ways and should not be used by the state government or the public for the purpose of assessing the likely costs of CARB’s plan,” he wrote.

Stavins later told The Wall Street Journal that if shifting to cleaner-but-costlier energy were good for businesses, they would have already done it.

That’s such a crisp, simple Occam’s Razor way to frame this issue.

Unfortunately, in the California of 2014, when it comes to economics, we’re in a post-common sense era.

‘Skimp’ on wages? You’ll make less money!

This is playing out in San Diego, where the City Council’s liberal supermajority wants to make a big splash before November elections in which they are likely to lose their power to impose legislation over a veto by Republican Mayor Kevin Faulconer.

The main way they want to make this splash is by sharply increasing the minimum wage in the city. The initial proposal was to make it $13.09 cents an hour by July 2017. That would be nearly one-third higher than the $10 that will be the minimum state rate effective 2016.

Business interests point out that this will hurt San Diego on competitiveness grounds. Advocates initially responded by saying job losses from a minimum wage hike would be minimal. But somewhere along the way, the spirit of the loony air board infected their thinking, and now San Diegans are being told that a minimum-wage hike is, yes, a rising tide that will lift all boats.

Consider this nugget from this op-ed defending the City Council’s plan. The gist is that business operators who try to keep costs down are idiots who don’t know what they’re doing:

“Employers who skimp on wages and benefits don’t make more money, they make less. They have greater turnover, resulting in more training, and they engender less loyalty and more cheating.”

Oh, give me a break.

CA activists lecture business on how to make money

According to this one-size-fits-all theory, Wal-Mart and carwashes and taco stands and all the non-union companies in the world that try to keep wages down are simply buffoons who are lucky to still be in business.

The arrogance of this is stunning.

The truth, of course, is that — as the world’s leading environmental economist told The Wall Street Journal — businesses won’t reject strategies that make them money. They will embrace such strategies.

But as I said, we’re in a post-common sense era in which activists and liberal pundits who have never made a payroll or run a business look at successful businesses and say something akin to the following:

Hey, you idiots, you don’t know what you’re doing.

Surreal. And so California-ish.

By Chris Reed

One of the most befuddling things about being a public-policy watcher in California in recent years has been the durability of the argument that the higher energy costs forced by 2006’s passage of AB 32 won’t be a drag on the state economy. Instead, the claim goes, the innovation triggered by the mandate that California use cleaner-but-costlier types of energy will at the least make up for jobs lost because energy is much cheaper in rival states and nations.

Now I understand why religious greens would believe this. But allegedly rational, neutral journalists? Incredibly, it wasn’t until this March that The Los Angeles Times had a news story that operated from the straightforward premise that AB 32 carried huge risks for the state economy.

‘Rising energy prices a threat to competitiveness’: Duh

In Europe, however, the learning curve is a little farther along. This is from a Financial Times article headlined “High energy prices for industry occupy officials at EU summit”:

“[There is] a growing fear in Europe that rising energy prices now pose a threat to the industrial competitiveness of a region mired in recession. It has been driven home by a steady stream of announcements from European manufacturers about plans to build new production facilities in the US.”

And where are those European manufacturers planning to build new factories? Not in California. In states with access to cheap natural gas made available by fracking, such as Louisiana, Texas and Pennsylvania.

But then the California media have a little problem with reporting on fracking, too. They can never even bring themselves to admit the Obama administration supports it. Even when Obama’s secretary of the interior says it loudly and clearly.

A dead heat in the Reverse Pulitzers competition

This creates a dilemma for those on the Reverse Pulitzer jury. Who deserves the 2013 award?

1) The legions of California journos who idiotically argued that high energy prices will be good for or won’t hurt the economy, or …

2) The legions of California journos who dishonestly depict fracking as new and evil while never mentioning that the Obama administration backs fracking as just another heavy industry.

On the other hand, it’s no dilemma at all when you think about it. Everyone in Group 1 is in Group 2, and vice versa.

Reverse Pulitzers for the lot! My congratulations! Y’all are doing a hell of a job!