
Tech IPOs could be windfall for California budget - sahin-boydas
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/tech-ipos-could-be-windfall-for-california-budget-2019-03-31
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dpflan
This seems like an interesting moment for the state to invest in
infrastructure. Perhaps there is a way to redistribute some wealth for
societal progress.

~~~
djakjxnanjak
Let’s build the planned Caltrain tunnel into downtown SF and BART tunnel into
downtown SJ so the impact on the housing market is distributed more widely and
people from more backgrounds can afford to commute to these centers of
economic growth. And let’s legalize the construction of high-rises within 1
mile of any BART or Caltrain station and invest in increasing the frequency
and hours of the trains.

~~~
grandmczeb
Please run for office because this sounds great. Maybe throw something in
about repealing prop 13 too.

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marcrosoft
If you know you are about to receive a huge windfall of life changing amounts
of money why wouldn't you move to a income tax free state 6 months ahead of
time?

~~~
viscanti
Maybe life is about more than just minimizing tax obligations?

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crummy
Maybe we should think about some high speed rail options!

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ams6110
It will all be spent, nothing will improve, and a few people will get rich.
Guaranteed.

~~~
wahern
Governor Newsom is more fiscally responsible than most. It will be more
difficult for him than Governor Brown to say, "No". Newsom commands less
respect, and has less experience, than Brown. But don't forget that Newsom was
Governor of San Francisco during the Great Recession, and San Francisco was
the _only_ large city in the state to maintain a balanced budget. Part of that
was a pre-existing mandate that SF maintain a rainy day fund; but part of it
was Newsom's City Hall extracting major concessions from unions and interest
groups, shrinking expenditures. And SF wasn't as filthy rich as it is now. The
big migration of tech from South Bay to the city didn't really get moving
until about 2011.

~~~
masonic
"San Francisco is officially $10 billion in the hole"

[https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/san-francisco-is-
officially-...](https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/san-francisco-is-
officially-10-billion-in-the-hole/)

~~~
wahern
This is mostly the result of (a) voter-mandated, retroactive benefit increases
and (b) courts forbidding the city (and voters) from rolling back those
retroactive increases. See

[https://calpensions.com/2017/07/03/san-francisco-pension-
deb...](https://calpensions.com/2017/07/03/san-francisco-pension-debt-not-
curbed-by-voters/)

The following case relates to just one particular benefits measure:

[https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/sf-loses-lawsuit-against-
may...](https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/sf-loses-lawsuit-against-mayor-lees-
pension-reform-measure-pays-out-750k-in-legal-fees/)

City leadership itself has been relatively fiscally responsible. For example,

[https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/SF-taking-
steps-...](https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/SF-taking-steps-to-
avoid-projected-future-budget-13509714.php)

Which is actually quite impressive, IMO, because the _pressures_ to spend are
enormous, and the city does indeed spend quite a lot. The politics at the
Board of Supervisors is intense and there's a large populist faction that
would like to spend much more. But at the end of the day what really matters
is who is elected to City Hall, and at least when it comes to fiscal
responsibility Newsom, Lee, and now Breed put a strong emphasis on long-term
budget viability. But sometimes--like with voter-mandated expenditures--their
hands are tied. Mayor Breed _opposed_ the recent Prop C which raised several
hundred million in new revenue for spending on homelessness. (She supported a
similar future ballot measure, but wanted to wait things out. Working under
Mayor Lee she already had a sense of what was in the pipeline and wanted to
see how those initiatives developed. And Lee and others were expecting another
downturn very soon so were more concerned with shoring up the budget to avoid
having to make deep cuts.)

EDIT: Also, the growth in healthcare costs is eating everybody alive. What
should really worry people is whether California voters mandate single payer.
Because California is limited in how it can control cost growth--most policy
control resides in Washington, e.g. pharmaceutical regulation--it'll be a huge
problem. But we won't be able to blame politicians for it.

~~~
masonic
Calling these "voter mandated" is a serious stretch. It was the government
agencies who _put them on the ballots_ (as _opposed_ to any voter
initiative/petitioning), and it was those same government agencies who
_utterly lied_ about the fiscal effects in the ballot statements, as detailed
in your own link. Quoting:

'The grand jury suggests voters may have been misled by official ballot
pamphlet cost information on two of the three “significant” pension increases
described in the report. A dozen retroactive retirement benefit increases
between 1996 and 2008 are listed in a report appendix.

Voters were told that even with a retroactive pension increase for most
employees (Proposition C in 2000) the city is not expected to make an annual
payment to the retirement system “for at least the next 15 years.”

The eight-year period with no annual city payment to the retirement system,
known as a “contribution holiday,” ended in 2004.

For a police and firefighter pension increase (Proposition H in 2002) voters
were told that with a “large surplus” city contributions should not be needed
for at least 10 years — but if needed, police and firefighters would pay “all
or part” of the added cost.'

