Wildfires

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Higher Prices During Crises – Is It Really Price Gouging?

On New Year’s Day, months after wildfires had started their deadly march through California, the Los Angeles Times published an article headlined “After the flames, allegations of rent-gouging fly in devastated wine country communities.” It did not include a single defense of higher prices, which indicates bias, or economic ignorance ...
California

What California Should Do To Ease Housing Crisis

In September, Sacramento lawmakers passed more than a dozen bills aiming to begin healing the state’s housing sore. It was, to their thinking, “Housing Day” in California. Two weeks later, legislators joined Gov. Jerry Brown in San Francisco as he signed what he called “15 good bills.” “Today, California begins ...
Blog

Housing shortage goes from dire to desperate after wildfires

A few months ago, Tim Anaya and I interviewed for PRI’s podcast Farhad Zabihi, a math professor at the College of Marin, who had been house hunting for nearly a year in Marin County.  Marin is just south of Napa and Sonoma — two of the hardest hit counties in ...
Blog

The Political Aftermath of California’s Wildfires

The amount of time it takes a celebrity of the political left to blame a natural disaster on global warming can usually be measured in seconds. Gov. Jerry Brown quickly answered the challenge last week by coldly politicizing the deadly Northern California wildfires. Following the master blueprint Chicago Mayor Rahm ...
Blog

On Wildfires and Wine

Small business owners and entrepreneurs have always been the backbone of California’s economy.  No one can deny the courage of those individuals who risk all for an idea and a dream.  For the vintners, growers, restauranteurs, and small business owners who live and work in California’s wine country, that courage ...
Business & Economics

Federal Tax Proposal Could Raise Insurance Costs In Earthquake Country

California is called earthquake country for good reason. There are nearly 2,000 known fault lines crisscrossing the state, and scientists continue to discover new fault lines all the time. Nearly every Californian lives within 30 miles of an active fault line. The U.S. Geological Survey recently released a study identifying ...
Business & Economics

The $2 Trillion Hole

Promised pensions benefits for public-sector employees represent a massive overhang that threatens the financial future of many cities and states. LIKE A CALIFORNIA WILDFIRE, populist rage burns over bloated executive compensation and unrepentant avarice on Wall Street. Deserving as these targets may or may not be, most Americans have ignored ...
Business & Economics

No roads to recovery in sight

With California teetering on insolvency, government union activists and liberal legislators are trying to whip the public into a “please tax us more” frenzy by scaring people about the consequences of spending cuts. At a union rally in Sacramento recently, one protester hoisted a “Raise Our Taxes” sign, which typifies ...
Climate Change

Californians’ Global Warming Fervor Cools

New York Times, August 3, 2009 Californians’ eagerness to battle global warming seems to be cooling a bit: The latest survey on the state’s environmental attitudes, released on Wednesday, showed that 47 percent consider the threat of global warming very serious, a decline of seven percentage points from two years ...
Commentary

This’ll Be Huge: WellPoint to Cover “Medical Tourism” Outside U.S.

A growing number of Americans are interested in going abroad for surgery. Hospitals in India, Thailand, and other countries are able to offer high-quality treatment for a fraction of the cost of American hospitals. This enterprise is called “medical tourism”. Indianapolis-based WellPoint, which covers 35 million Americans, has decided to ...
Blog

Higher Prices During Crises – Is It Really Price Gouging?

On New Year’s Day, months after wildfires had started their deadly march through California, the Los Angeles Times published an article headlined “After the flames, allegations of rent-gouging fly in devastated wine country communities.” It did not include a single defense of higher prices, which indicates bias, or economic ignorance ...
California

What California Should Do To Ease Housing Crisis

In September, Sacramento lawmakers passed more than a dozen bills aiming to begin healing the state’s housing sore. It was, to their thinking, “Housing Day” in California. Two weeks later, legislators joined Gov. Jerry Brown in San Francisco as he signed what he called “15 good bills.” “Today, California begins ...
Blog

Housing shortage goes from dire to desperate after wildfires

A few months ago, Tim Anaya and I interviewed for PRI’s podcast Farhad Zabihi, a math professor at the College of Marin, who had been house hunting for nearly a year in Marin County.  Marin is just south of Napa and Sonoma — two of the hardest hit counties in ...
Blog

The Political Aftermath of California’s Wildfires

The amount of time it takes a celebrity of the political left to blame a natural disaster on global warming can usually be measured in seconds. Gov. Jerry Brown quickly answered the challenge last week by coldly politicizing the deadly Northern California wildfires. Following the master blueprint Chicago Mayor Rahm ...
Blog

On Wildfires and Wine

Small business owners and entrepreneurs have always been the backbone of California’s economy.  No one can deny the courage of those individuals who risk all for an idea and a dream.  For the vintners, growers, restauranteurs, and small business owners who live and work in California’s wine country, that courage ...
Business & Economics

Federal Tax Proposal Could Raise Insurance Costs In Earthquake Country

California is called earthquake country for good reason. There are nearly 2,000 known fault lines crisscrossing the state, and scientists continue to discover new fault lines all the time. Nearly every Californian lives within 30 miles of an active fault line. The U.S. Geological Survey recently released a study identifying ...
Business & Economics

The $2 Trillion Hole

Promised pensions benefits for public-sector employees represent a massive overhang that threatens the financial future of many cities and states. LIKE A CALIFORNIA WILDFIRE, populist rage burns over bloated executive compensation and unrepentant avarice on Wall Street. Deserving as these targets may or may not be, most Americans have ignored ...
Business & Economics

No roads to recovery in sight

With California teetering on insolvency, government union activists and liberal legislators are trying to whip the public into a “please tax us more” frenzy by scaring people about the consequences of spending cuts. At a union rally in Sacramento recently, one protester hoisted a “Raise Our Taxes” sign, which typifies ...
Climate Change

Californians’ Global Warming Fervor Cools

New York Times, August 3, 2009 Californians’ eagerness to battle global warming seems to be cooling a bit: The latest survey on the state’s environmental attitudes, released on Wednesday, showed that 47 percent consider the threat of global warming very serious, a decline of seven percentage points from two years ...
Commentary

This’ll Be Huge: WellPoint to Cover “Medical Tourism” Outside U.S.

A growing number of Americans are interested in going abroad for surgery. Hospitals in India, Thailand, and other countries are able to offer high-quality treatment for a fraction of the cost of American hospitals. This enterprise is called “medical tourism”. Indianapolis-based WellPoint, which covers 35 million Americans, has decided to ...
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