Productivity Crisis in Sacramento
At a time when productivity gains are helping drive the U.S. economy to new heights, the California legislature is going the other way. Dan Walters of the Sacramento Bee reports on research by a legislative staffer that reveals
… over time, the Legislature’s production of bills has been dropping dramatically, and growing proportions of measures are being rejected by governors. … In sheer numbers, legislative output began to decline sharply in the 1990s, during the governorship of Republican Pete Wilson. It fell even lower after Democrat Gray Davis succeed Wilson in 1999. Today it’s running roughly half of what it had been in the 1970s and 1980s. The most recent legislative session generated just 961 bills, the lowest of any year since 1967.*
The ‘quality’ of the bills can’t be measured. But with the legislature we have, we’re happy that they’re doing less. We won’t even ask them to return a portion of their pay!
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* Of those 961, Governor Schwarzenegger signed 729.
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October 20th, 2005 at 3:42 pm
Wouldn’t it be nice if the national legislatures were to have this productivity “problem”.
Chuck
October 20th, 2005 at 9:19 pm
On The Third Hand Trying to reason with hurricane season (yet again) Moore’s Lore Warren Buffett’s Internet Power Play Independent Sources Productivity Crisis in Sacramento Kerabu Free cake, she said powered by zFeeder PagesLosing Custody of My Hope