Capitol Weekly: ‘California should stop funding its progressive values on the backs of the poor’

In a new op-ed for Capitol Weekly, BESI senior researcher Sam Trachtman makes the case for revisiting how California funds regulations that serve its progressive goals.

Trachtman is the author of a recent series of white papers on making California more affordable. In the third installment, published back in June, Trachtman explores how many of the state’s policies that aim to improve safety, sustainability, and quality raise the cost of essentials — a funding mechanism that hits low-income residents hardest. He shows how regulations in three key policy areas — energy sustainability, housing, and occupational licensing — impose hidden and diffuse costs on Californians, and offers recommendations to overcome political obstacles and achieve durable reform.

Trachtman’s op-ed picks up this thread from the white paper. “Change will be hard, but making sure that rules work well and aren’t more burdensome than needed, especially to those already struggling economically, shouldn’t be controversial in California,” he writes.

Read the full op-ed now in Capitol Weekly.