California's Water Crisis

[Farm Boy]

The water rights are priced into the valuation of the land if the property tax scheme is at all normal. Which means they pay, or at least should be paying, for owning it every year. If Californians aren't going to up their game to outbid the Chinese for the water, or pay the price to buy the water rights, we have a problem with the paradigm. We've crammed stuff into that arid land like it has abundant water. It doesn't. If you want that many people to live there the valuation of the limited resource must rise.

 

[schlaufuchs]

The water rights are priced into the valuation of the land if the property tax scheme is at all normal. Which means they pay, or at least should be paying, for owning it every year. If Californians aren't going to up their game to outbid the Chinese for the water, or pay the price to buy the water rights, we have a problem with the paradigm. We've crammed stuff into that arid land like it has abundant water. It doesn't. If you want that many people to live there the valuation of the limited resource must rise.

Except it's not going to for the farming interests. And that's precisely the problem. Northern California actually has decently abundant amounts of water. It's not tropical or anything like that, but it's certainly not a desert. Most of that water just gets committed elsewhere, namely Southern California and the Central Valley. Which is fine when we aren't in a drought. But now that we're in a significant and protracted drought it's becoming a problem.

 

[Farm Boy]

Right, but when Chicago is in your state, Chicago's problems and idiocies are your problems and idiocies. Shame you can't outvote them. Welcome to the gentle auspices of the will of the majority.

 

[Wolfbeckett]

I think us Southern Californians and you northerners should stop disparaging each other and join forces to kick out the real problem: the farmers!

(No offense to your vocation, Farm Boy)

I used to enjoy almonds until I learned how big of a water suck they are, now I can't even eat them without feeling like a part of the problem :/

 

[Farm Boy]

We're a pretty standard punching bag Wolf. We're also used to the gentle auspices of the will of the majority.

Didn't you know agriculturalists are responsible for war and homerseksualities?

 

[GoodSarmatian]

Hmm...interesting...
So, you are saying all I have to do to bring forth the downfall of the American Empire is eat almonds from California...

 

[Timsup2nothin]

First, I have to say this, sort of a de rigueur thing...

While northern California is not desert, everyone knows northern California doesn't count so it is still accurate to say California is a desert.

Moving on.

Let's get all the stupid desert dwellers relocated. Farm Boy, There's about 30 million people right here by me, and then there's San Diego, Phoenix, Tucson's not really big, Vegas at two million plus...all told I'd say we need about three, maybe four more Chicagos planted out there in the wet and wonderful midwest. You pick. Where do you want them?

 

[Farm Boy]

Indiana.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Indiana.

Don't they already have basically the same problem you have? With the entire state being run for the benefit of Indianapolis?

If Bhsup were here he would put them all in Kansas, for sure.

 

[Farm Boy]

I wanted to pick someplace with more water. I wasn't mean enough to say Alabama.

 

[Wolfbeckett]

We're a pretty standard punching bag Wolf. We're also used to the gentle auspices of the will of the majority.

Didn't you know agriculturalists are responsible for war and homerseksualities?

Really it's only the ones here I have a problem with, the huge agribusinesses sucking our state dry, knowing full well what they're doing, but not giving a damn, because they know that as soon as they've finished bleeding us like a vampire they can just leave, go somewhere else, and the rest of us will be the ones that have to deal with the aftermath of their atrocious behavior.

 

[Farm Boy]

It's always the close ones that are the problem. Can you believe some jerk demolished one of my neighbor's gardens? I mean it was off their back lawn in a field nobody was using for anything!

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Really it's only the ones here I have a problem with, the huge agribusinesses sucking our state dry, knowing full well what they're doing, but not giving a damn, because they know that as soon as they've finished bleeding us like a vampire they can just leave, go somewhere else, and the rest of us will be the ones that have to deal with the aftermath of their atrocious behavior.

Funny thing about water...if the agribusinesses left there would be plenty, even if they had "sucked the state dry" first. Water is basically income, not savings. Our problem is that when our income gets cut back a bit, the belt tightening in the budget doesn't affect agriculture. So they are never going to leave, because our water income will always be enough for them since they get first cut.

We would be well advised to accept that thirty million people living in a water forsaken desert is more than enough and stop growing Los Angeles like we are in some sort of one city challenge population contest though. But since the entire state is dependent on that economic engine there's problems with that as well.

 

[illram]

We used to just pay farmers in CA to let more fields go fallow. That was when they grew primarily wheat and cotton. Now they grow much more lucrative food and it's too expensive to buy them all off to save the water.

Something has to be done though. Residential rationing will help but urban areas only consume 20% of the water in the State. Improved and modernized water delivery and storage--stormwater capture, water recycling, even desalinization will help but on a timeline beyond the immediate need for rationing the remaining supply. I think there is no question that unless we see some major improvement in rainfall or the snow pack next year we are in for some years of pain. Invest in bucket futures.

 

[Wolfbeckett]

Residential rationing will help but it will also piss a LOT of people off. We're having to suffer for some megacorp's profits. And what do we get in exchange? Jobs for illegal immigrants and produce prices that somehow don't seem any lower than anywhere else despite having a lot less distance to ship.

Run these jerks out on a rail I say.

 

[Farm Boy]

If you want more water, you can pay more money. They've purchased a valuable resource, the market has incentivized it through hollering that people should be eating higher quality food, the industry has responded by producing it.

But I hear ya, I want a lot of resources seized from banks and financiers/finance professionals(they're the ones that look like tics from where I stand), only natural that people would want resources seized from people like me, or corporations they see as the other.

 

[illram]

You do realize how important agriculture is to the California economy? Locally and nationally it is very important. Just in state dollars (GSP) it's a $23 billion industry--and this does not account for the national and international jobs CA food production supports.

"These jerks" are an integral part of what makes CA the biggest economy in the US. Unless you want some tasty lead infused strawberries from China?

 

[Wolfbeckett]

If you want more water, you can pay more money. They've purchased a valuable resource, the market has incentivized it through hollering that people should be eating higher quality food, the industry has responded by producing it.

But I hear ya, I want a lot of resources seized from banks and financiers/finance professionals(they're the ones that look like tics from where I stand), only natural that people would want resources seized from people like me, or corporations they see as the other.

The free market idea is great and all except that it doesn't apply in this case. The big water rights in CA were bought at market price, sure... 100 years ago. Hardly a reflection of the modern value.

 

[Farm Boy]

Assets appreciate as well as depreciate.

 

[illram]

Moderator Action: I split this off from the clown car thread. Have at it.