Why do people stay in California?

[tabs]

Originally Posted by ckelly78z

in my neck of the woods (literally), I can commute 10 miles to work into a town that is 50,000 population with most of the amenities. I leave home at 4:30 am, and many days, I encounter 2-3 cars on my route, and on the rare day, I mistakenly think that it must be a holiday that I didn't know about zero (0) cars, or red lights all the way through town.

I'll take my 10 acres of homestead paradise along with it's changing seasons, over massive traffic jams, and endless people everywhere (in the big cities).

Hey I think that idear is catching on as the City Slickers move to Green Acres... there are 10,000 unsold Apts in NYC as the exodus is in full swing to the Hamptons green acres...

Gone now are Neiman, Barneys, Brooks Brothers all Bked...

that Lil Chief does a gud job on Salmon, and cheese as it is a low watt unit..with a low temp as it's high temp. It would be better if it had a two stage heating element. On a cold day it is just about worthless..the aluminum body is so thin it hardly retains heat.

With Sausage it puts the smoke flavor on but has to be finished in the oven to bring it up to finishing temp. I bought it on a lark at the Thrift to play with...cheap thrills...for me in low budget land...I used to smoke cigars but now suck on Polo Mints...

The problem I have run into is that all my other units, and one that I have seen all are difficult to maintain a low temp required to smoke fish, cheese and sausage. They tend to run too hot. You need about a constant 175* temp...to get to 155* for sausage.

[group911@aol.co]

I always find that people who say they hate California - and there are plenty- probably have issues.There is nothing you can't do or have done in the state of California.
It's an absolute money making machine that has and will continue to attract the most creative people from all over the world.

[3rd_gear_Ted]

The season's are different;
Wind, rain, fire & smog.

"What's your dream" Pretty Woman, Julia Roberts
From obscurity to riches SoCal style is a classic example.

The East has Woody Allen

[tabs]

Originally Posted by group911@aol.co

I always find that people who say they hate California - and there are plenty- probably have issues.There is nothing you can't do or have done in the state of California.
It's an absolute money making machine that has and will continue to attract the most creative people from all over the world.

Well we know why you are not there.

[ckissick]

Here are a few more reasons CA is great.

[tabs]

What drove CA population growth during and after WW2 was Aerospace and Defense work. Argriculture remains big but does not need a lot of people, except to pick the crop. In the 30's it was the Okies and after the war the Mojados.

Hi tech up in the Bay area, Sunnvale ..started because of DOD and it's proximity to Stanford. Guns Bombs and bullets...ask me how I know..

S CA in particular was DOD heaven with all those Cold War contracts...all HIGH PAYING JOBS which attracted people from all over. And because of all the money made RE expensive.. You had Aerojet Gen, Hughes, McDonald, Douglas, Lockheed, TRW, Republic as some of the major playas... After 1990 and the end of the CW..all of that went away...and with it the end of Conservatives in power. As the place started to become increasingly over run with the peoples of colour the politics increasingly became Liberal...

Where did Ronnie call home again??? hmmm....what did Ronnie do as his first order of business as Prez....rebuild the military you say...and wasn't Cali his home? Lots of money was funneled into Cali because of defense spending... Now ya got Social Welfare checks coming from the Fed. So the more poor minorities who are now the majority vote Liberal to keep the money coming. Meanwhile all the big corps have gone elsewhere because of taxes and regs..

Where did Nixon call home... Whittier, Ca you say. He kept the money flowin to CA with DOD work...and with it CA in his pocket..

I was acquainted with the Millhouse Boyz...real charmers they are or were..

[tabs]

The beginning of Silicon Valley was HP..started in a Palo Alto Garage in 1938 by 2 Stanford grads...making electronic testing equipment...their first customer was Disney..for work on the movie Fantasia..

then during WW2..

they worked on counter-radar technology and artillery shell proximity fuzes during World War II, which allowed Packard (but not Hewlett) to be exempt from the draft.[12] Hewlett served as an officer in the Army Signal Corps after being called to active duty. In 1942, they built their first building at 395 Page Mill Road and were awarded the Army-Navy "E" Award in 1943. HP's line of products during the war included the audio oscillator, a wave analyzer, distortion analyzers, an audio-signal generator, and the Model 400A vacuum-tube voltmeter, and employed 200 people. WIKI.

At the end of 1968, co-founder Packard handed over the duties of CEO to Hewlett to become United States Deputy Secretary of Defense in the incoming Nixon administration.

The WOZ of Apple Fame worked for HP...hee haw..

[fintstone]

Originally Posted by tabs

I moved her in May of 03...by the Spring of 04 my house went up 83.47% in value. At the peak value in 06 it had increased by 97.47% in value. At the low in 12, it had decreased 24.36% from what I had paid for it. At that point in early 12 home prices were crumbling..and if left to continue the value of residential RE in the USA would have gone into the abyss..as in wiped out.

Figure it out if you bought a house for 500K had lets say a 400K mortgage and the house was now worth lets say 100K...you are 300K UNDERWATER on the mortgage..that is the kind of thing that was happening...PEOPLE WERE WALKING AWAY FROM THOSE MORTGAGES...whole neighborhoods of 100's of houses here in LV were FORECLOSED upon because people walked away. Or stopped paying the mortgage until they were evicted.. I am talkin about 850K houses on Golf Courses in LV in 07.

The kicker in this is that there are still a lot of those houses that are STILL EMPTY...after more than 10 years..the lights are on and the ceiling fan is twirling but no body lives there. I can drive you by those houses...to show you.

What save our miserable azzes in 2012 is that the FED instituted QE3 which included 45B a month in Mortgage Backed securities and 40B in US Treasuries. ...otherwise you Boyz wouldn't be smilin right right now but cryin the blues while taking your fkin Opiods...

I have been hammerin away at this for more than a decade..but I keep gettin the bird flipped at me...by the smiling faces who think they are doin swell in Equities, RE and or their own lil patch of the economy.

I am a fkin Macro Econ Boy..I am gud at it..I can construct and deconstruct this shyte in the abstract in my sleep. It is an equation in my head, it is like a swiss watch ticking away with all of these moving pieces moving through space and time...and I am going Uhh ohhh we is movin like a little Dingy in the current to Niagra Falls... we are in a "Twilight Zone" atmosphere tottering on the brink of the abyss...

What I am workin on and I may run out of time is to get my azz out of this house and into a trailer on the desert outside of Pahrump...this RE and Equity euphoria ain't gona last forever before the plunge into the deep. If I don't make it I am never gona be able to move..

I listened carefully to what my parents and relatives had to say about the Depression..it was like wrestling with a GD Grizzly Bear with your bare hands. Then I compare that with what is going on today and know this time it is gona be a lot worse cause the USD ..World Reserve Currency is fkin used toilette paper.

That notion is virtually inconceivable for Americans to grasp, because they have never gone through a currency collapse like Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Zimbawe among others. The GD USD has been the rock of Gibralter to them..steady and true...Guess what NOW IT AIN"T NO MO..

Apple is fkin leveraged to the eyeballs even with 200B in cash in the bank..they can increase their market cap by moe holding on to those stock buy back shares than they can make selling product. Disney is another one...get the idear...

It is time to go check on my smoking sausage..

I lost (on paper) 68% on my LV home (that I bought in 2006) in the crash. I just kept making the payments. My word is good, and I said I would. Maybe there are other folks like me.

Your house should be worth quite a bit more than you owe as you should have been making payments for almost 20 years (assuming you did not pay cash). You bought at a better time than I did...and things have improved a lot since 2012.

[fintstone]

Originally Posted by GH85Carrera

Well said. Having driven the 405 at rush hour once, that was enough for my lifetime. Back when I commuted to work an regular basis I could drive 3 miles before I saw one single other moving car.

We live in a very nice house with a 3 car garage, that we paid off years ago. We live a very comfortable lifestyle here but we would be paupers in NYC or any coastal city in California.

LOL. The first time I flew out to LA, it was for a 4hr meeting that appeared to be about 20 minutes away (from the map). I gave myself an hour to drive it so I could get there early. I was still stuck in traffic on the 405 when the meeting ended...so I just turned around and came home.

[fintstone]

Originally Posted by group911@aol.co

I always find that people who say they hate California - and there are plenty- probably have issues.There is nothing you can't do or have done in the state of California.
It's an absolute money making machine that has and will continue to attract the most creative people from all over the world...

If you work smart and hard, you can become relatively wealthy anywhere. I don't think anyone hates CAlifornia. Just the opposite (although the residents do seem to want to tell the rest of us what to do...and generally considers anyone that does not share their viewpoint inferior). I love the scenery and the beaches in CA...but the lifestyle for most folks is just not Baywatch, American Graffiti, or the Brady Bunch. The cities are crowded, dirty, and everything costs much, much more. Crime is high and so are taxes. The long shutdown will hurt state and local revenues immensely.

If you are wealthy, it is likely the best of times and the best of places...where everything you could ever want is available and at arm's reach. The weather is good, etc. But the typical person probably has a grueling commute to a job in a cubicle and gets home late, too tired to frolic on the beach or see a Redwood on the weekend. The only hope he has is that his home goes up in value enough that he can cash in some day. There is an awful lot you cannot do in California without time/money.

[tabs]

From the jump SF was a socially tolerant town..it was the gate way to the Gold mines in the Sierra's as such people from all over the world went through SF..

Cali helped finance the American Civil War with the Gold it mined...

In the 1870's mining started to decline, as a law was passed to protect Agricultural land from the debris from the Hydraulicing of Cal mountains for Gold. Argraculture, RR and finance..were big.

[Scott Douglas]

Originally Posted by fintstone

LOL. The first time I flew out to LA, it was for a 4hr meeting that appeared to be about 20 minutes away (from the map). I gave myself an hour to drive it so I could get there early. I was still stuck in traffic on the 405 when the meeting ended...so I just turned around and came home.

All you guys complaining about the 405 give me a real chuckle.
It was my commute route for 27 YEARS during my working life. North OC to LAX area.

[tabs]

Originally Posted by fintstone

I lost (on paper) 68% on my LV home (that I bought in 2006) in the crash. I just kept making the payments. My word is good, and I said I would. Maybe there are other folks like me.

Your house should be worth quite a bit more than you owe as you should have been making payments for almost 20 years (assuming you did not pay cash). You bought at a better time than I did...and things have improved a lot since 2012.

This house is still quite a bit away from it's value in 2004. Nearby new homes of this size are roughly the same as that value if not a bit more..But yeah I am ahead of the game..at least for now..

Counting homes as Piggy Banks started in Cali in the mid to late 70's..with the Carter era inflation. In 1978 my Dad's house was valued at 48K almost overnight it went to 150K...Porsches were 6500 then to 15K... It was a delayed reaction to Nixon taking the USA off the Gold Standard..and substituting a FIAT currency..backed by nothing.

People should not count on homes being Investment vehicles aka Piggy Banks...they are an Overhead expense being a place to sleep at night. That was the way it was.

Homes because of the declining value of the MONEY..USD are reflecting the value of that money..which over the years has been a declining asset...wonder why the Stock Market is up..cause you money is worth the value of used toilette paper...

Look at this way..the economy is DEAD DEAD DEAD and is on FED and Treasury Life Support... 50 % of GDP is accounted for by govt spending...WOWSER!!! Meanwhile as a reflection of ALL THAT MONEY BEING PRINTED THE REAL VALUE OF THE MONEY HAS PLUMETTED and it's REAL VALUE is reflected by Equities and to some extent RE. Which has been up up and up and away...

The shyte will hit the fan when Corp cash flow starts to fall as they can't sell anything cause so many are unemployed and have no money to buy buy buy.. that is why so many retailers are now in BK and commercial RE is tottering on the brink because of it...no sales.

So far Disney furloughed 43K employees and is now laying off a further 28K...cash flow is way down..meanwhile they are leveraged to the hilt..on cheap money which they bought back shares of their own stock. if cash flow slows enough they might not be able to service the leverage...then it is BK or spin off of assets time for Disney.

Royal Dutch Shell is layig off I thnk about 7800...

[RWebb]

California's a Garden of Eden
A paradise to live in or to see...

[RWebb]

Originally Posted by Noah930

Not that this will apply to any of us, but our state is trying to pass a wealth tax. And if you leave, it will be retroactive for 10 years. How can Kalifornia make non-residents pay taxes? I'm not trying to PARF up the discussion, but I'm just not sure how they will exert jurisdiction on people who are really gone. Maybe levy the taxes against any remaining property (i.e. 2nd/3rd/4th house)?

it's called long-arm Jd. - IIRC all the states have it

(and each state has to 'respect the rights' of every other state)

[fintstone]

Originally Posted by Scott Douglas

All you guys complaining about the 405 give me a real chuckle.
It was my commute route for 27 YEARS during my working life. North OC to LAX area.

I cannot even imagine.

[tabs]

Originally Posted by Scott Douglas

All you guys complaining about the 405 give me a real chuckle.
It was my commute route for 27 YEARS during my working life. North OC to LAX area.

That was then and this is now...Back in the early 70's the Ventura Freeway still moved along pretty good at rush hour..say around 45 mph if memory serves.....since the mid 80's it has been a parking lot at Rush hour..

Back in the early 80's my Dad used to commute from Glendora in the San Gabriel Valley all the way to TRW in Redondo Beach everyday..even then that is a fking hike...you could not do that today.

[Noah930]

Originally Posted by fintstone

If you work smart and hard, you can become relatively wealthy anywhere. I don't think anyone hates CAlifornia. Just the opposite (although the residents do seem to want to tell the rest of us what to do...and generally considers anyone that does not share their viewpoint inferior). I love the scenery and the beaches in CA...but the lifestyle for most folks is just not Baywatch, American Graffiti, or the Brady Bunch. The cities are crowded, dirty, and everything costs much, much more. Crime is high and so are taxes. The long shutdown will hurt state and local revenues immensely.

If you are wealthy, it is likely the best of times and the best of places...where everything you could ever want is available and at arm's reach. The weather is good, etc. But the typical person probably has a grueling commute to a job in a cubicle and gets home late, too tired to frolic on the beach or see a Redwood on the weekend. The only hope he has is that his home goes up in value enough that he can cash in some day. There is an awful lot you cannot do in California without time/money.

I agree with a lot of this post (particularly the 2nd paragraph). Most people that I know wouldn't. But then again, that's probably why they'd never contemplate leaving this place.

[Scott Douglas]

Originally Posted by tabs

That was then and this is now...Back in the early 70's the Ventura Freeway still moved along pretty good at rush hour..say around 45 mph if memory serves.....since the mid 80's it has been a parking lot at Rush hour..

Back in the early 80's my Dad used to commute from Glendora in the San Gabriel Valley all the way to TRW in Redondo Beach everyday..even then that is a fking hike...you could not do that today.

We moved into our house in 1985 and my commute was 405 for those 27 yrs starting then. So don't talk to me about 'parking lots' Tabs. I recognize a parking lot when I see it.

I worked with guys that were commuting from Lancaster to RB every day. Glendora would be a cake walk to them.

[Noah930]

Originally Posted by tabs

That was then and this is now...Back in the early 70's the Ventura Freeway still moved along pretty good at rush hour..say around 45 mph if memory serves.....since the mid 80's it has been a parking lot at Rush hour..

Back in the early 80's my Dad used to commute from Glendora in the San Gabriel Valley all the way to TRW in Redondo Beach everyday..even then that is a fking hike...you could not do that today.

I grew up in Laurel Canyon. As a kid, driving to the beach in Santa Monica took about half-an-hour. About 15 years ago, my sister was living at home and working in Santa Monica--16th Street, IIRC. It would take her 45 minutes to get there in the morning, and 1:15 to 1:45 to get home.

Selfishly, I actually like it when gas costs $5/gallon. For once, traffic drops.