Wrong lord of the universe

The bleak figures, however, need not be a harbinger of gloom, said Michael Dozier, executive director of the California Partnership for the San Joaquin Valley, an organization of public officials and business leaders that aims to address the region's economic, environmental and social problems.
"When studies like these come out, it's not like they're telling us anything new," he said. "What they do is show us how much better things could be with all the resources we have. … We should laugh at it and say, 'It just gives us that much more room to improve.' " -- Modesto Bee, April 2, 2012

 

We suspect that regardless of the possible merits of high speed rail, the reason people in the Valley distrust it is that it is a huge project involving a great amount of public debt, and the people who live at the epicenter of the greatest credit fraud in world history know -- not that debt can be manipulated to the benefit of the plutocracy and the detriment of ordinary citizens -- but that it will be manipulated that way.
No amount of utterance from "leaders" and "experts" (particularly economists and journalists) is going to persuade most readers of the article posted below that the Valley economy is improving. The only things growing in this economy are the number of homeless and dairy debt.
Modesto richly deserves its place at the bottom of the economic heap nationwide. No city did more to create an entire culture, doctrine and orthodoxy devoted to creating residential growth as the lord of the universe (realtors piously babbling Christian soundbites all the way down the path). In Modesto, political and business leadership perfectly blended in the creation of the Great Valley Center, now a defunct appendage of UC Merced. Founded by a former mayor of Modesto responsible for more irresponsible growth than any before or since her, the GVC had mabition, agression, domination and funding, first from the witless Packard Foundation, which got its fingers burnt on the UC Merced project, then from developers and companies that supply them expertise and capital. GVC had one message: "Don't think; Grow!" It stupefied a new generation of leaders in perhaps a more economical way that previous generation of leaders had been stupefied.
Among the institutions that grew but did not think was the McClatchy Chain itself. The result was that when the growth and its real estate-advertising revenue stopped, Mama McClatchy became a Zombie Mama, the media equivalent of the Bank of America.
Although you can trace the path Modesto took, it is much harder to know with enough accuracy to believe, why Modesto did it. Most people will say it's easy to see why, pointing to their favorite explanation for the ongoing economic collapse in the north San Joaquin Valley. These are the same reasons that can be used for Stockton and Merced, beginning with commuter demand for cheaper housing and perhaps ending with the securitization of subprime mortgaages. But that doesn't explain the economic recklessness of a class of business people, most of whom identify themselves as conservatives and Christians.
Why, evidently, of all the places in the nation, were Modesto, Stockton and Merced home to the most reckless, destructive political economic leadership? Why are so many of those elected and appointed public officials still in power? Is it just because concentrated wealth can keep buying the officials it needs? Is it just because the most obvious center of critical thinking in the region, the new UC Merced, was corrupted at birth by its role as anchor tenant of the building boom? The university conceals the names of the members of its board of trustees from the public. We know they buy their positions with financial gifts. We know they are local people. We deduce they were big winners in the real estate boom rather than the people they fleeced.
It's fascinating to see -- as has been noted at least since the time of Thorsten Veblen -- how that quintessential red-bloeded American, the hyper-aggressive, grasping, short-sighted businessman buys prestige and honor with contributions to universities in return for their silence.
Badlands Journal editorial board
 
4-2-12
Modesto Bee
San Joaquin Valley economy growing so slowly…Patty Guerra and Tim Sheehan pguerra@modbee.com • tsheehan@fresnobee.com
http://www.modbee.com/2012/04/01/v-print/2139826/valley-economy-growing-...
A report shows something that won't surprise most area residents — communities in the San Joaquin Valley are among the nation's slowest in recovering from the recession.
Modesto's change in housing prices from the peak in 2006 ranked dead last among 100 large population centers, the Brookings Institute said in its latest MetroMonitor report, released last week. In the past six years, housing prices here have plummeted 65.2 percent.
The area's unemployment rate ranked 99th, the report says. Only Fresno was worse.
The Brookings study evaluates gains or losses in employment, changes in the unemployment rate, changes in the value of goods and services produced in the area, and housing-price changes.
The bleak figures, however, need not be a harbinger of gloom, said Michael Dozier, executive director of the California Partnership for the San Joaquin Valley, an organization of public officials and business leaders that aims to address the region's economic, environmental and social problems.
"When studies like these come out, it's not like they're telling us anything new," he said. "What they do is show us how much better things could be with all the resources we have. … We should laugh at it and say, 'It just gives us that much more room to improve.' "
Gokce Soydemir, professor of business economics at California State University, Stanislaus, took an even more optimistic view.
He pointed to statistics from the Bureau of Labor Statistics that show for the first time in four years that average yearly job growth in the San Joaquin Valley (made up of Stanislaus, San Joaquin, Merced, Fresno, Kern, Kings, Madera and Tulare counties) climbed back into the positive category.
"The direction of change is quite significant for us here in the valley," Soydemir said. "Employment is growing. People are finding jobs."
The Brookings report says one factor common to many of the lowest-performing metro areas was that they were hit the hardest when the housing market collapsed.
The report also shows that jobs are painfully slow to rebound across the country.
"Employment rebounded from its low point in 94 of the 100 largest metropolitan areas by the fourth quarter of 2011," co-authors Howard Wial and research assistant Siddarth Kulkarni wrote, "but only 25 gained back more than half of the jobs they lost between their employment peak and their post-recession employment low point."
'Natural' jobless rate by 2014
Only five communities, they added, made a complete job recovery.
The researchers also pointed to a correlation between the housing market and jobs. "Unemployment rates were generally highest in the California, Nevada and Florida metropolitan areas that suffered severe house price declines during and after the recession," the report states.
Dozier said economic development officials up and down the valley want to draw attention to the potential for growth in manufacturing and technology related to agriculture, energy and water.
Soydemir said the recovery, while frustratingly slow for those who have been out of work for months or even years, is gaining steam in the first months of 2012.
"It's beginning to become a self-sustaining expansion," he said. "The (federal government) is not intervening. We see employment going up, construction activity is more vibrant."
He added that he anticipates the country reaching what he refers to as its "natural unemployment rate" of 5.5 percent, compared with its current 10.9, by the end of 2014. By that time, the valley should also reach its "natural unemployment rate" of 11.2 percent to 11.4 percent, down from the current 17.1 percent.
That's a long time, but still, he said, the economy seems finally to be headed in the right direction, even here.
"In 2011, the question was whether we were in a recovery or not," he said. "Right now the question is, 'How fast are we recovering?'
"It's a better question."