Chief Executive magazine says that California ranks dead last as the worst place to do business in the United States. I’m a little suspicious of any list that ranks California #34 in “living environment,” since that’s precisely the reason so many people put up with our high taxes and regulations, but I suppose they have their reasons. In any case, there’s a flip side to this. Guess which state Oxfam ranks as the best state for workers?
I imagine this is sort of a zero-sum game. If a state is good for CEOs, it’s probably not so great for workers, and vice versa.
But wait! As it happens, despite our terrible taxes and endless rules and high minimum wage and environmental tomfoolery, it turns out that the average income of the top 1 percent in California is over $500,000. That’s the highest outside the mid-Atlantic and the 6th highest in the country. So for all their bitching, and for all the worker protections we have in place, California seems to be a pretty good place for CEOs after all. Maybe there’s a lesson to be learned from—
Nah. What am I thinking?
