Yet the President of the United States seems to spend a lot of time trying to make Russians happy, and zero time making Californians happy.
Hollywood is still a thing. Manufacturing, yes manufacturing. Agriculture. The Bay Area is a fraction of that GDP, and a small geographical part of California.
The disproportionate power relative to its economic significance is a political choice.
It just can't be done economically, because yields of a nuke(pun intended) don't immediately map onto economical values. Not just immensely positive or negative, but actually tangential to the currency dimensions.
But I wonder if it wouldn't be more healthy for you if the states grew a bit more independent.
It would give the president less power to decide exactly how schools and universities should be run or would open up for social welfare reforms in the states that want it.
It's been a long process to get that much power in the federal government - it goes back at least to FDR (so, near a hundred years now), and I've seen arguments that it goes all the way back to the Civil War. But I do firmly believe that the centralizing of power is destroying us. We got away with it when the nation was more united in its values and culture, and even then it could be contentious. But today vast swathes of the country share little to nothing in the way of values or culture. Of course we can't get along when such widely disparate groups of people are tied together and a single government body is controlling large portions of their lives.
A lot of it is. For example the California housing shortage? It’s all state and local. But the same single family zoning pattern played out in many places.
He doesn’t have that power. But he’s taking it, and the parties who are supposed to be stopping him are uninterested in doing their job.
This may actually be a good thing (although they missed the chance to gain some confidence by doing it in a chaotic way).
I am certain that California could run their own DOE.
Land borders and water rights. I don’t see it working out.
And the idea that you have to make 'Russia happy' because they have nukes, if fucking beyond dumb.
Russia, on the other hand, supports the President, so they deserve to be rewarded.
You forgot the /SS [Not being historical, damn autocorrect, i mean hysterical, but comments; comments, they're a beautiful thing, comments - i meant /sarcasm, sarcasm. Beautiful sarcasm, they had sarcasm-such a beautiful word - two hundred years ago...etc, etc.
This won't last once the US population starts declining. We've been held afloat by immigration but even that's running out.
Japan was ahead of the curve in terms of modernity. Looking at them is almost like looking at our own future.
This is one of the reasons that nominal GDP isn't all that useful a metric.
'Running out' - cute euphemism for 'you're not welcome', and very much worser: 'deportation'.
In fact, when immigration begins drying up, the US will become much much more open to it.
It would be interesting to compare economies of the same scale, regardless of legal status: If you are considering the US and China, maybe you should include the whole of the EU. And if you are looking at Germany, Japan, ... It makes sense to not only include California, but also to split up other countries. I'm curious how high up Guandong or Shanghai would be for example.
The fact that the US and China show up as single countries (and not "continents"/regions) whereas the EU shows up as a bunch of "small" countries is source of a lot of inferiority complex in Europe.
It's also the only thing that can work in Europe. Anything smaller would make Europe irrelevant on the global stage, and something much more invasive would erase Europe as we know it.
The current mood in smaller European countries is that even though many are skeptical of French and German influence, our interests align most of the time, especially now that the US has succumbed to fascism and stupidity.
Surprisingly far down: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_first-level_administra...
California, Texas, England, New York, Guangdong, Jiangsu. Both with slightly smaller GDP than Russia, the 11th largest economy.
More interesting is the PPP table where Guangdong is close to California.
On the one hand, yes, you're right, the EU is more powerful economically as a whole than as individual states. But on the other hand the individual states are a bit less unified than the US or China. So they are a bit more individual in the first place.
EU countries still have:
- their own laws and constitutions
- their own foreign policy, embassies, intelligence services, armies, etc.
- their own taxation; there actually is no EU tax (though there is some pressure to create such a thing)
- their own policies for education, healthcare, social security, taxation, trade, etc.
- their own currency in some cases (e.g. Denmark, Sweden, Poland and many other eastern European countries)
- border disputes like Cyprus, the Balkans (several former Yugoslav countries are members or aspiring to be). And though not part of it, you might count Greenland here as it is Danish with a special status.
As a trade block, the EU is pretty large. And the sphere of influence also includes former soviet states not part of the EU, Turkey, Northern Africa, etc. But it doesn't speak with one voice like the US and China tend to do. Also there is a lot of division on topics like e.g. the Ukraine war, energy, and a lot of other topics.
- its own laws and constitution, search "Constitution of California"
- its own taxation (e.g. sales tax differs between states, just as VAT rates differ between EU countries; Americans pay income tax to their state as well as the federation)
- its own policies for education, healthcare (not sure about social security, and not for trade)
- some US states have border disputes with other states, e.g. Tennessee vs Georgia (Possibly the EU does not, they must be resolved before joining, though I can't find a good article on this).
- the USA as a whole has border disputes with Canada
The EU presents more division on more topics than the USA, but the USA isn't united on e.g. energy policy.
JP can still be 1/3 larger than california US compels them to appreciate. I think 140 is probably a good balance for JP exports (high tech) and imports (energy, commodities/inputs).
Or Trump makes USD weaker.
ksajadi•9mo ago
NewJazz•9mo ago
https://prospect.org/features/senatorial-privilege/
Manfred•9mo ago
dyauspitr•9mo ago
platevoltage•9mo ago
bigstrat2003•9mo ago
The electoral college is flawed but I also find it better than the alternative. It's important that the president should represent a wide variety of perspectives in the country, not just pander to the population of the n biggest cities and call it a day. The people living in small or unimportant states deserve to have a president who gives a damn about them, too. Ultimately I think both of these mechanisms are important ones to ensure that the country doesn't turn into a classic tyranny of the majority, which is something I value quite a bit.
janalsncm•9mo ago
CalRobert•9mo ago
Also works though
perilunar•9mo ago
robocat•9mo ago
simonask•9mo ago
For example, each Maltese member of the European Parliament is elected by 90,000 voters in Malta. Each German member is elected by ~878,000 voters in German, meaning each Maltese citizen has about 10x more power than each German citizen.
In this case, the German "bloc" is still vastly more powerful, but the disproportionate representation is important to ensure the loyalty of small nations, who are always incentivized to navigate much narrower interests.
raverbashing•9mo ago
NIMBYs limiting growth.
Crazy crime handling policies in SF (which are getting reverted now).
Cities outside the main centers (SFBA, LA, etc) dying.
Complete political ineptitude for things like HSR
No wonder they're losing population
janalsncm•9mo ago
Austin is quickly building more housing though, which I am a fan of.
WalterGR•9mo ago
They’re not. Net change went negative during the pandemic but has since rebounded. California’s population fell in only 3 of the years 2011 - 2024.