Newsom insists California is ‘doing pretty damn well’, citing record profits in Silicon Valley from both the major tech firms and a host of IPOs. He seems to be unaware that California’s middle- and working-class incomes have been heading downwards for a decade, while only the top five per cent of taxpayers have done well. As one progressive Democratic activist put it in Salon, the recall reflects a rebellion against ‘corporate-friendly elitism and tone-deaf egotism at the top of the California Democratic Party’.

Much of this can be traced back to regulatory policies tied to climate change (along with high taxes). These policies have driven out major companies – in energy, home construction, manufacturing and civil engineering – that traditionally employed middle-skilled workers. Instead, job growth has been concentrated in generally low-pay sectors, like hospitality. Over the past decade, 80 per cent of Californian jobs, notes one academic, have paid under the median wage. Half of these paid less than $40,000.

The argument for progressive government has been further undermined by extraordinarily poor governance. In 1971, John Kenneth Galbraith described California’s state government as run by ‘a proud, competent civil service’, enjoying among ‘the best school systems in the country’. Half a century later, few would say that about a state that has so grossly mishandled unemployment claims. It dished out $11.4 billion in fraudulent benefits claims during the pandemic, while failing to pay or freezing the claims of over a million eligible Californians.