By Assemblyman Dan Logue, for the California Political [N]ews and Views, 7/26/10
If you had a choice between paying several thousand dollars a year in higher utility, fuel, food and other costs, and temporarily postponing an ineffective global warming law until the economy improves, it would be a simple decision, right?
Well, thanks to the 800,000 voters who signed petitions to put the California Jobs Initiative on the November ballot, voters will actually have a chance to make that choice.
The California Jobs Initiative is a common-sense proposition that will temporarily suspend implementation of AB 32, the states global warming law, until our unemployment rate returns to a level closer to where it was when the law was originally adopted by the Legislature.
If successful, the initiative will save over a million jobs and save California businesses and families billions of dollars in higher energy and other costs resulting from regulations aimed at reducing greenhouse gas, or carbon, emissions associated with global warming.
Heres why. AB 32 requires a radical shift in where California gets its energy, necessitating huge investments in alternative power sources such as wind, solar, and hydrogen. Its estimated the transition will cause gasoline and diesel prices to increase by $3.7 billion a year, natural gas rates to go up by 57% a year, and electricity rates to rise by up to 60%.
Other AB 32 regulations are expected to increase the cost of a new home by $50,000 and add several thousand dollars to the price of a new car. And the Air Resources Board is considering a cap and trade carbon tax of $143 billion.
Those higher energy costs will translate to increased overhead for businesses large and small, who will pass all or part of that cost onto their customers in the form of higher prices not only for utilities and fuel but just about everything we use on daily basis, such as food.
Those higher prices are likely to result in a downturn in business, which in turn will lead over a million lost jobs, according to a recent study.
Its bad enough that these billions in higher costs and loss of a million jobs would come at the worst possible time, considering there are almost 2.3 million Californians already unemployed, our states chronic $20 billion budget deficit and hundreds of billions in debt. But AB 32, which was created specifically to help reduce global warming, wont make one bit of difference in terms of worldwide greenhouse gas emissions reductions.
Because global warming is a global challenge, and because California accounts for a minuscule percentage of all greenhouse gas emissions, AB 32 on its own cant make a difference in global warming. The California Air Resources Board itself has conceded: California acting alone cannot reduce emissions sufficiently to change the course of climate change worldwide.
And California indeed would be acting alone if we implement AB 32 as currently scheduled. Other states and other nations have dramatically downsized their climate change plans in recognition of the fact that their economies just cant sustain the costs necessary to meaningfully reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
I recently asked Californias non-partisan Legislative Analysts Office (LAO) to evaluate what the impact of going it alone with AB 32 would be on our states economy. The response was disturbing.
The LAO found that California-only implementation of AB 32 would be likely to adversely affect Californias economy in the near term because of the related energy price increases. This would in turn result in higher prices for goods and services and reduced production, income and jobs.
The LAO has reported elsewhere that suspending AB 32 would save local governments and the state millions in costs, and prevent loss of tax revenues as well.
One other important fact: AB 32 deals only with carbon emissions, which while associated with global warming present no threat to public health or the environment. California already has the strictest laws in the county to protect our air and water from smog and other pollutants, and those laws will remain intact under the California Jobs Initiative.
Unfortunately the Governor, the Legislature and the Air Resources Board have steadfastly refused to intervene in the timing of entirely symbolic global warming regulations that could turn our states current economic crisis into a permanent financial disaster.
Thats why the California Jobs Initiative is so important. It will protect over a million jobs and save California families and businesses billions of dollars in higher energy costs. Considering wed be spending that money and sacrificing those jobs for a global warming law that wont do anything to reduce global warming, it should be an easy choice for California voters.
oOo
Assemblyman Logue represents the 3rd Assembly District in the California Legislature, which includes the communities of Butte, Lassen, Nevada, Placer, Plumas, Sierra and Yuba.
We are fortunate to have an insider who sees the world in a sane way, and he has sent me this information. Actually, he has his own site (CA Political News), and I highly recommend it. This particular post may be found here.
May you walk with the LORD always, and when you cannot take another step, may He carry you the rest of the way until you can walk along side Him again.
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