Democrats love to crow about how they care more about Mr. and Mrs. Mainstreet America, but if California is an example, their claim is much different from reality.
An exhaustive new study found that businesses are fleeing the Golden State in droves, with the vast majority citing high taxes and a hostile Democrat-imposed regulatory system as the most common reasons why they are leaving.
“The hostility that California legislators — and their colleagues in regulatory agencies — show toward business enterprises is hardly imaginary,” relocation specialist Joseph Vranich writes in the 623-page report that contains almost 3,500 endnotes.
Titled, “It’s Time for Companies to Leave California’s Toxic Business Climate,” the report, based on public records, found that “California disinvestment events” between 2008 and 2016 numbered 2,183.
However, the real number of businesses that have left the state is likely far higher because “experts in site selection generally agree that at least five events fail to become public knowledge for every one that does,” making the actual figure something closer to 13,000.
Importantly, Vranich notes that the departures are picking up, not slowing.
Vranish, who moved his own company, Spectrum Location Solutions, from Irvine, Calif., to more business-friendly Pennsylvania, also writes that there has been a hostile business environment in the Golden State dating back 40 years.
Businesses shouldn’t be fleeing in droves, as The Daily Caller notes:
California is blessed with an overly generous share of built-in advantages. Its weather is the envy of many. So is its natural beauty. It has an educated work force, iconic universities, and ranks high in health-care quality. It’s overflowing with natural resources and has prime access to Asian markets thanks to geography. California is one of the most fertile gardens on Earth, is a tourist destination for the entire world, and uniquely hosts a pair of economic titans in Hollywood and Silicon Valley.
So why are businesses bolting? Excessive regulations and high taxation.
“California’s regulatory environment is the most costly, complex and uncertain in the nation,” according to Vranich, adding that the regulatory environment in the state is the worst in the nation.
As for taxes, California ranks 49th according to the Tax Foundation’s 2019 State Business Tax Climate Index.
California is also dead last in overall quality of life, according to McKinsey & Company, the report noted.
Democrats have been in charge of California at the state and local level for decades, and now have supermajorities in the legislature. This is their legacy.