A worker inspects planks at a California timber yard. (Photo: sirtravelalot, via Shutterrstock)The year 2021 was a long year battling COVID-19. As coronavirus restrictions ease under Gov. Gavin Newsom’s SMARTER Plan in 2022, we turn to the Golden State’s labor market. Is it on track to rebound to its pre-pandemic shape? Here are the employment numbers, then and now.
Image by gguy, via ShutterstockCalifornia stands to gain additional clout in Washington when Joe Biden is inaugurated as the nation’s 46th president on Jan. 21st. We already have Californians in powerful Washington positions, of course — including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco, who was just reelected easily to her post, and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy of Bakersfield.
A worker spreads warning tape at a home being cleansed of lead paint. (Photo: D_Townsend, via Shutterstock)OPINION: The right of citizens to propose laws by ballot initiative is one of California’s great checks and balances. Often viewed as a last resort to express the will of the voters (see: Proposition 13), it can also be incorporated into the legislative process. At the end of June, the Legislature faced nine proposed initiatives that would likely qualify for a vote in November.
A retiree checks out the newspaper in his back yard. (Photo: Budimir Jevtic, Shutterstock)Calpensions: A board working on a proposal to enroll most small business employees in a state-run retirement savings plan, unless they opt out, was told last week that small technology-focused financial firms could do the job. The founders of three firms that offer 401(k)s and other retirement plans to small businesses did not object to competition from the state.
Sen. Fran Pavley, D-Agoura Hills, chair of the Senate Natural Resources and Water Committee, addresses colleagues on the Senate floor.(Photo: Rich Pedroncelli/AP)To environmentalists in California, across the nation and around the world, she is a trailblazing leader. To the California Chamber of Commerce and many Republicans, she is the unrealistic author of job-killing, la-de-da legislation. To some, she is a futurist who predicts gas stations will disappear in 10 years. She is Fran Pavley, a pleasant, gray-haired Democratic state senator from Southern California who does not come across as a firebrand but can grow passionate about protecting the environment.
Candidates in the 7th Senate District: Orinda Mayor Steve Glazer and Assemblymember Susan Bonilla, D-Concord. (Photo illustration, separate images combined: Tim Foster, Capitol Weekly)Welcome to the 7th Senate District, where money and hardball politics came together in the primary election. The runoff likely will not be much different. Even in a state now accustomed to seven-digit spending in legislative campaigns, the 7th District showdown in May is likely to set records. And powerful interests that weighed in during the primary – organized labor, business interests, the dentists, the doctors and the fire fighters, for example – are all but certain to pony up again.
OPINION: Senate Bill 3, authored by State Senator Mark Leno (D-San Francisco), would enact an unwarranted additional hike in the state’s minimum wage, similar to his measure earlier this year, SB 935, which was a California Chamber of Commerce “Job Killer”. California’s minimum wage was just raised $1 to $9 per hour on July 1 of this year, well above the current $7.25 per hour mandated under federal law.
OPINION: Every once in a while there are glimmers of hope that the California Legislature gets legal reform and the impact it has on the lives of business people throughout the State of California. One of those moments came with the defeat of AB 2416 by State Assemblyman Mark Stone, which would have dramatically increased lawsuits against small business owners.
Two days after Democrats secured 54 of 80 seats in last November’s election, Assembly GOP Leader Connie Conway was re-elected in a unanimous caucus vote and appeared to be secure in her position.
But whispers of her possible demise as leader surfaced last month as a result of the party’s loss of seats in