My grandfather used to sing to me, “Good, better, best / never let them rest / till the good is better / and the better is best.” I appreciated that lesson and have been applying it to try to make sense of a recent bill signed by California governor Gavin Newsom. While the bill may be the result of Newsom’s grandfather singing to him about “bad, worse, and worst,” I have determined it is more likely a case of bad/worse/worst economic thinking. It exposes a level of bad that most economic teachers likely never bother to discuss.
AB 1228 is an unusually precise and dramatic bill related to the minimum wage. Currently, the minimum wage in California is $15.50 per hour. This bill raises the minimum wage to twenty dollars per hour for employees who specifically work in
Bad, Worse, Worst: The Misguided Perfectionism of Gavin Newsom
November 11, 2023