Solar Farms Should Not Displace Prime Farmland

By Edward Ring
11/21/2022
Successfully coping with severe droughts in California and the Southwest requires tough choices, all of them expensive and none of them perfect. But taking millions of acres out of cultivation and replacing them with solar farms is not the answer. California produces over one-third of America’s vegetables and three quarters of the country’s fruits and nuts –...

TAGS: Central Valley, electricity, environmentalism, Green Energy, Solar Power

Questions About Water for Governor Newsom

By Edward Ring
08/26/2022
  Borrowing a page from the More Water Now campaign, which unsuccessfully attempted earlier this year to qualify a water funding initiative for the November 2022 ballot, Governor Newsom announced a new water supply strategy on August 11. Perhaps with the presidency in mind, or perhaps because he really means it, Newsom’s remarks were surprisingly accommodating towards those of us who...

TAGS: California water policy, environmentalism, Gavin Newsom, Newsom, water rationing, water reuse, water storage

The Abundance Choice: The Complete Series

By Editorial Staff
06/16/2022
Note: This webpage is dedicated to the complete The Abundance Choice series by Edward Ring. In this series, Edward Ring, a contributing editor and senior fellow with the California Policy Center, examines California’s ongoing water crisis and the many years of failed water policies that got us here. Ring outlines the challenges facing California’s leaders...

TAGS: California water policy, Edward Ring, environmentalism, water rationing, water reuse, water storage

Defining Appropriate Housing Development in California

By Edward Ring
02/19/2019
One of the most frustrating contradictions inherent in the policies being enacted by California’s one-party state goes something like this: We are inviting the welfare cases of America and the expatriates of the world to move here, while simultaneously enacting environmental policies that make it extremely time consuming and expensive to build anything. No wonder there’s a “housing crisis.” Until demand...

TAGS: California, Development, environmentalism, Housing

Rhetoric to Challenge California’s Statist Elites

By Edward Ring
11/22/2017
California’s ruling elites have enacted policies that make it impossible for middle class citizens to live here. They have artificially elevated the cost of living, nearly destroyed public education, decimated public services, neglected public infrastructure, and declared war on small business. To deflect criticism, they’ve convinced a critical mass of voters that any attempts to...

TAGS: capitalism, environmentalism

Environmentalism Provides Moral Cover for New Taxes to Fund Pensions

By Edward Ring
01/17/2017
There are two intertwined themes that define unionized government in California. First, funding government retiree pensions will soak up every new source of tax revenue they will ever collect. Second, cloaking new taxes and fees – and new agencies – in the virtuous raiment of environmentalism will deflect criticism and demonize critics. Here’s why: Now...

TAGS: artificial scarcity, cap and trade, environmentalism