Joel Kotkin: The Great California Exodus

wsj online

Excerpts:

• Nearly four million more people have left the Golden State in the last two decades than have come from other states.
• Housing is merely one front of what he calls the "progressive war on the middle class." Another is the cap-and-trade law AB32, which will raise the cost of energy and drive out manufacturing jobs without making even a dent in global carbon emissions.
• "green energy doesn't create enough energy!" Mr. Kotkin exclaims
• In a nutshell, "the state is run for the very rich, the very poor, and the public employees."
• So if California's no longer the Golden land of opportunity for middle-class dreamers, what is?
  
  Mr. Kotkin lists four "growth corridors": the Gulf Coast, the Great Plains, the Intermountain West, and the Southeast. All of these regions have lower costs of living, lower taxes, relatively relaxed regulatory environments, and critical natural resources such as oil and natural gas.

Comment:

The "progressives" like to claim the shrinkage of the middle class as one of their big concerns.  But look at one of their big, blue states- and you see a different picture.  California is pushing the middle class out of state.