Californians Send Loud Message: The State Is a Mess

Opinion

Portrait of CalMatters Columnist Dan Walters

By Dan Walters, CalMatters Commentary

Published 9 months ago on

December 10, 2024

Trump's victory reflects widespread voter discontent with economic conditions, mirrored in California's shifting political landscape. (Shutterstock)

PPIC survey reveals 56% of Californians expect financial hardship, with pessimism crossing party lines and income groups.
High living costs in California drive population outflow, potentially impacting future congressional representation and electoral votes.
The state's Democratic leaders vow to lower cost of living but have few tools to make a difference.

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Pundits and academics who have parsed the data of Donald Trump’s presidential victory five weeks ago differ on the fine points but generally agree that it reflected voters’ widespread unhappiness with the status quo, particularly their personal finances and inflation.

Dan Walters

CalMatters

Opinion

Living costs jumped about 20% under the Biden administration. While its policies may not have been directly or fully responsible, it’s a time-honored political axiom that if voters have serious economic concerns, they will punish the party in power.

As James Carville, who ran Bill Clinton’s successful 1992 presidential campaign, famously said, “It’s the economy, stupid.” Clinton’s campaign portrayed then-President George H.W. Bush as oblivious to voters’ angst, just as Trump did against Vice President Kamala Harris.

California’s Blue State Status Doesn’t Shield From Economic Concerns

California, of course, is a deeply blue state so Harris could count on capturing its 52 electoral votes. But its voters were, in the main, just as frustrated — if not more so — about the impact of inflation. The state’s presidential vote reflected it.

Harris garnered roughly 9.3 million votes in California, nearly 2 million votes and 5 percentage points fewer than Biden received in 2020, while Trump’s 6.1 million California votes were slightly higher than his 2020 showing.

PPIC Survey Reveals Californians’ Economic Pessimism

A new attitudinal survey by the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California quantifies the unrest behind Harris’s mediocre showing in her home state.

Furthermore, the PPIC poll found, “Only one in three Californians think that the American Dream — the notion that if you work hard, you’ll get ahead — holds true.”

“Over the next 12 months, 56 percent of adult residents expect bad times financially in California,” PPIC pollsters wrote of the survey, which was conducted just after the election.

“Today, solid majorities of Republicans (60%) and independents (65%) are pessimistic, compared to 47% of Democrats,” they added. “And majorities across income groups and state regions expect bad times financially in the next 12 months.”

Furthermore, the poll found, “Only one in three Californians think that the American Dream — the notion that if you work hard, you’ll get ahead — holds true. About half or more across partisan and demographic groups and state regions think the American Dream once held true, while 15 percent think it never held true. Just 25 percent of 18-to-34-year-olds and 26 percent of renters think that the American Dream still holds true.”

Finally, more than 60% of those surveyed — and at least majorities of all partisan, economic and geographic subgroups — believe that the American Dream is more difficult to achieve in California than anywhere else. That belief led to 26% of adults saying that a lack of well-paying jobs in California has made them consider moving, mostly to other states.

Adults with children, renters and young adults are most likely to consider moving.

California’s Economic Reality and Political Implications

These attitudes reflect the reality of life in California. Everything is extraordinarily expensive here — housing especially — and the state has seen a strong outflow of population in recent years to states with lower costs for housing, utilities and other necessities of life. If it continues, California will lose congressional seats after the 2030 census and therefore its electoral votes.

Gov. Gavin Newsom and his fellow Democrats who control the Legislature have sensed voters’ sour attitudes and have pledged to work on lowering living costs, but they don’t have many ways to do so. The 20% inflation is already baked into the economy and the state lacks the powers of a federal government over interest rates and money supply that would be needed to have noticeable impact.

Newsom’s two terms as governor will expire two years but there are at least a half-dozen Democrats who appear interested in succeeding him. If the negativism of the new poll persists, the 2026 election will be another opportunity for California voters to send a message.

About the Author

Dan Walters has been a journalist for nearly 60 years, spending all but a few of those years working for California newspapers. He began his professional career in 1960, at age 16, at the Humboldt Times. CalMatters is a public interest journalism venture committed to explaining how California’s state Capitol works and why it matters. For more columns by Dan Walters, go to calmatters.org/commentary.

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