https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomas...p-four-reasons-california-is-unsustainable/2/ That's $32,900 per capita in the state, three times higher than the national average for all states in the country. (and keep in mind this is on top the federal debt, and people's house mortgages in California also tend to be quite high) The state's tax rate is already high. Just to draw a comparison to the two other states on the West Coast, Oregon has an income tax, and the state of Washington has a sales tax. California has both.
They have at least 12% of the population of the USA and their economy is the sixth largest in the world.Their debt of $1.3 TRILLION is far better than that of our country which is lunging towards $22 Trillion.
That's true, but think about it: not only is the state responsible for their own state debt, they are also going to be liable for their share of the federal debt. When we're examining the effect of the debt burden, we can't look at any of this in isolation. It all goes together. Having federal debt is going to make it harder for them to deal with their state debt, and vice versa. Another thing to consider, because of the state's high cost of living the relative poverty rate (those with incomes that cause them to severely struggle to afford rent) has been calculated at 38 percent. (source here) That means it's mainly going to be the other 62% of California households on the hook for paying down those debts. Also that debt level I just mentioned was per capita. The general population is also composed of children and retired people, so about half the state's population is not in the labor force. What that means is that you're going to end up having a state debt burden of $105,000 fall onto the persons liable for paying it. Because obviously the debt burden isn't going to be evenly distributed across the entire population (i.e. a baby or someone earning minimum wage isn't going to be helping you pay down those debts).
