There are 12 propositions for Californians to decide.
Will try to walk through all 12 before election day.
There are a bunch of bonds.
1A - $9.95 billion for high speed rail
3 - $980 million for children's hospitals
10 - $5 billion for alternative energy
12 - $900 million for veterans home and farm loans
All great causes but the question is can California afford all these things?
The California budget was busted this past year and with the current economic climate, one wonders if we should be moving forward on these.
Here is an item from the Sacramento Bee from May discussing the budget crisis. Excerpt:
California's credit rating is already among the lowest of state governments. When the state took out an $11 billion loan from Wall Street during the 2003 budget crisis, taxpayers wound up paying the loan with interest - plus an $84 million fee for the cost of borrowing from investment firms.
So what is the current California bond rating?
Go here.
In short, $53 billion in bonds have been approved but not sold yet, $52 billion have been sold and need to be repaid and the ratings are as follows:
Fitch A+
Moody A1
S&P A+
According to Wikipedia these ratings indicate "upper medium grade" and "Safe investment, unless unforeseen events should occur in the economy at large or in that particular field of business."
A Google search leads to the Federal Census site and if you click here and scroll to data sheet number 430 you get a pdf listing the bond rating for all states as of 2006.
If I'm reading this right, California is 49th with only Louisiana with a lower credit rating.
Whoa!
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