California's Middle Class Crushed

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Happy Friday! Here's what's on our radar for May 3:

✔  California’s dwindling middle class is getting crushed by soaring utility bills with little help from state lawmakers.

✔  Why has Governor Newsom been silent during all the campus mayhem?

 ✔ Move over Ozempic, there’s a new sheriff in town in those weight loss wars.

✔ If you are hitting the beach this weekend, you might notice a blue blob invasion.

Cheers to 5 o'clock! 🍻

Netter News Team

MIDDLE-CLASS CRUSHED

California State lawmakers are facing mounting political pressure to help middle-class families who are getting crushed by soaring utility bills and sky-high electricity rates.

According to Matt Baker, director of the California Public Utilities Commission’s Public Advocates Office, one out of every five PG&E customers is now behind on their bills

HOW WE GOT HERE

• Along with exorbitant energy prices, Pacific Gas and Electric, the largest utility in California, introduced a rate increase last November to pay for “upgrades and safety improvements”.

• On average it increases customers’ bills by about $400 more a year.

• PG&E says they needed the money to mitigate wildfire risk🔥, which would allow their crews to put hundreds of miles of power lines underground.

• As for PG& E, they are profiting substantially. In mid-February, the utility reported an almost 25 percent increase in profits for 2023, totaling over $2.2 billion. This was BEFORE the new rates took effect on January 1.

MAD AS HELL

Millions of customers are angry with the increase- many taking to Netter’s X to vent their frustration:

MIDDLE-CLASS EXODUS

This increase does not bode well for Californians who are already struggling to make ends meet.

🏠Recent findings from California Community Builders, a housing research group, reveal that California is seeing a decline in its middle-class population.

🏠Between 2000 and 2019, the state lost 7% of residents in this group. Potential reasons for moving out could include job opportunities, housing/rent, and family.

🏠Middle income falls between 80% and 200% of the median income for a family of four (differs based on where you live).

🏠In Santa Clara County, where living costs are high, a typical four-person household brings in around $181k (that’s up from $125k in 2018).

WHAT’S NEXT

Middle-class Californians want answers and are demanding action, so far with little results.

• Last week, lawmakers quietly shelved a bill that would have proposed a monthly fee on electric bills. It didn’t make it out of the Assembly with a single vote.

• There’s another piece of legislation introduced in February by two state republican lawmakers. Assembly Bill 2205 would order the CPUC to cut electricity rates by 30%.

POLITICS, ECONOMY, EDUCATION & SCIENCE

CAMPUS FALLOUT

Let’s quickly catch you up on the mayhem at University Campuses across California and the country.

📌Cleanup continues today at UCLA and other universities following the crackdown on protesters who illegally occupied campuses across the UC systems.

📌More than 200 people were arrested at UCLA after they clashed with CHP and vandalized the campus. We are learning many of these people were both students and faculty.

📌At UC Berkley, the university has taken a “hands-off approach” and the tents keep growing. Sproul Plaza now has 175 tents pitched and hundreds of protesters hanging out.

📌USC now says it will hold a “Trojan family graduation” celebration at the LA Memorial Coliseum after canceling its graduation because anti-Israel protesters took over the campus. Reports indicate the USC President is now trying to hold on to her job.

📌University leaders across the country are facing mounting lawsuits because of the protests and also because they failed to protect Jewish students from harassment.

WHERE’S GOVERNOR NEWSOM?

While all the campus chaos was unfolding, Governor Newsom released this press release, declaring Arab American Heritage Month in California, but he didn’t have a word to say about the protests and violence erupting on the state-run University campuses.

HOT TAKES

🚨 TB OUTBREAK: There’s a public health emergency in Long Beach, following a tuberculosis outbreak that has killed one person and sickened nine others. The outbreak was traced back to an unidentified hotel.

 🚨 ABORTION BAN BATTLE: Arizona’s governor signed a bill to repeal the 1864 abortion ban revived by the state’s highest court. Did anyone check on Newsom’s whereabouts?

🚨 IRS AUDITS SURGE: The taxman wants to more than double its audit rate for the wealthiest taxpayers in what the IRS calls a “strategic plan update”. Californians have the most millionaires per capita so this should get interesting.

🚨 APPLE’S HAT TRICK: Apple kept investors smiling despite a dip in iPhone sales last quarter. While sales dropped 10% and revenue fell 90.8 billion, Apple announced a whopping $110 billion in share buybacks, its largest ever. It’s good to be king.

🚨 WEIGHTLOSS WARS: Oooh, ooh Ozempic, watch out. Each week more than 25,000 people are starting the weightloss drug Wegovy! That’s the competition to Ozempic which is now besieged by price gouging and supply issues.

GOLDEN STATE GLOW

• 🌴 Go see it why you can: the Getty Museum in Los Angeles might have to part ways with a 2,000-year-old Greek Statue. A European court says Italy has the green light to seize it.

• 🌴 Talk about a costly joyride, a driver lost control of a $1 million Porsche Carrera GT on a Bay Area highway. The driver is okay, but the car, one of only 1200 produced in the world, suffered quite a bit of damage.

• 🌴 Have you spotted them yet? Blue blobs, by the thousands, are washing ashore across Southern California beaches. What are they? Details below.

pacificbeachpage

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 🗓THIS DAY IN CALI-HISTORY

May 3: 

• 1923: The first nonstop transcontinental flight in the U-S took place from Long Island, NY to Rockwell Field in San Diego. The flight took approximately 27 hours to complete.

   

• 1980: On this day in 1980, SF Giants six-time all-star 1st Baseman Willie McCovey hit his 521st and final home run. While he played, he was known as the “scariest” hitter in MLB, known for his “dead pull” swing. #RIP to one of the greats.