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Comment by dr_doom | Hacker News Reader

He was being sarcastic, but you are right.

California has always been the place to "make it big". From tech to movies to the gold rush, the recent economic policies (last 30 years or so) have little to do with it.

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The proof's in the pudding. Look at CA, NY, MA, then look at Alabama. Every state that runs things the way the professor says they should is an economic shitshow with the exception of Texas, where there's oil and big liberal cities.

Are you arguing that Alabama would be better off imitating California's policies? Has it occurred to you that California has some natural advantages, none of which are attributable to its governance, that don't generalize to other states?

I'm arguing that if those policies were as awful as economic conservatives continually say, the West Coast and Northeast wouldn't be the best economies in the world.

There's clearly something positive to be gotten from investments in infrastructure and education.

You do realize that the economies in all of those places pre-date the policies they have now by a large margin, right?

California has, and always will be the gold rush state... taxes aren't going to change that.

Those policies have been in place since at least the New Deal, longer depending on how you want to quantify them.

If empiricism can't convince you, nothing can. Why even read my posts?

And the gold rush started in the 1840's, the NYSE was founded in the late 1700's.

What was that about empiricism?

Empiricism is believing the data.

The west coast and northeast have had a hundred years to fall apart because of their terrible liberal policies. They're doing great. The south and mountain west are much less economically impressive, despite their 'business friendly' policies.

So you've explained away 2 with anecdotes superior to data. 48 to go. Get started.

Also, by crediting the gold rush 150 years ago as being more relevant to California's current-day economy than it's horrible liberal policies, you're essentially saying that the actual policies don't matter.

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