A possible ray of sunshine for the Golden State: It looks like California’s overall population exodus has ended. It comes just as artificial intelligence (AI) is booming in a new rivalry with communist China.
The 67,000 California increase also was a rise of just 0.17 percent. Compare that to the 1980s, when the population rose from 23.7 million in 1980 to 30 million in 1990. That was an increase of 6.3 million for the decade, averaging 630,000 year. In 1987, the year I came here, it rose by 700,000 to 27.8 million, or 2.6 percent.
The 1980s were a fantastic time in California—almost like the 1960s, but without the Vietnam War raging and campus protests, which we have again. The Proposition 13 tax cuts from 1978 set the stage for low-tax economic growth. They were followed by the 1981 and 1987 national tax cuts by President Ronald Reagan, formerly California’s governor. George Deukmejian, governor from 1983 to 1991, kept state taxes low in the spirit of Prop. 13.
Housing still was fairly inexpensive, although interest rates began the decade higher than 20 percent, as President Reagan and Federal Reserve Board Chairman Paul Volcker wrung the 1970s-era inflation out of the economy. In 1983, national economic growth soared at 7 percent.
President Reagan’s defense buildup to counter the Soviet Union’s immense military especially powered Southern Californian’s aerospace industry, providing good, high-paying middle-class jobs to hundreds of thousands.
10-Year Exodus
Another measure is “net domestic migration,” meaning circulation among the 50 states. During the decade of 2013-22, California lost a net 1.84 million people to other states. Only New York was worse, losing 1.97 million.Manhattanization and Sorting
It was inevitable California’s population decline would reverse. The U.S. population overall keeps increasing every year, by 1.6 million overall last year, and not all of them are going to Texas and Florida.AI: Silicon Valley vs. China
And let’s not forget Silicon Valley. It’s still the Shangri-La of the global high-tech industry. As it has been since Bill Hewlett and David Packard founded their company in a Palo Alto garage in 1939.California’s government budgets benefitted from all of that—albeit suffering the boom-bust cycle of massive surpluses followed by massive deficits that mirrored the ups and downs of Valley stock prices. Which we’re going through once more this year with a state budget deficit estimated at as much as $73 billion.
Now California is lucking out again. Just when it seemed there was nothing new to invent, along comes AI. In the past, Japan and recently South Korea provided some competition for Silicon Valley. This time, the top rival for AI is much more serious: communist China, with its raw production capacity and vast armies of engineers.
Signs of Recovery
Instead of startups in garages, now it’s “hacker homes.” Mind the Bridge reported, “Silicon Valley and San Francisco are (as usual) leading the pack on the innovation movement, with 2,101 AI scaleups that raised $143.7B in total. Therefore, it does not come as a surprise that Open AI’s president Sam Altman has called San Francisco ‘the best place to start an AI company.’ A new zone designated ‘Cerebral Valley’ or “HAIyes Valley” (with hacker houses operated out of historic Victorians near Alamo Square) is attracting AI startups from across the country, and expanding AI companies are growing their office footprint in the City.”Given how the Russia-Ukraine War rapidly has developed AI weapons, along with China’s AI military threat, the U.S. military and intelligence agencies also will be investing many more billions in Silicon Valley and Cerebral Valley.
Young geniuses aren’t going to care much about paying high California taxes to be at the center of the AI universe. But as in the 1980s, it would help if taxes and regulations were cut to turbocharge the boom—and to help the rest of us who are just plain middle-class folks trying to keep our heads above water in this expensive place.
Finally, it’s ironic those who most benefit from America’s capitalist economy, California entrepreneurs, are among the most left-wing people in the country. Maybe, like Elon Musk, now longer a resident, some of them will realize what’s really going on and lead a 1980s-style restoration.
With the Beijing AI train coming right at us, we’re going to need it.