We just reeeeeally want to believe, more than other states, that our government is The Good Guys and we can Fix The Problems if we only added more laws and more taxes. Every two years we are presented with 20 earnest-seeming ballot measures that each have roughly this message:

> "We have a major problem in California -- ____ is not as ____ as it should be. Prop 1234 authorizes the state to sell $__,000,000,000 in bonds[1] to be repaid over the next 30 years. This will completely fix the ____ problem. By the way, it looks like a lot, but it's actually a good investment that will SAVE TAXPAYERS MONEY in the future."

Then we get another almost identical one in 3 years saying that ____ is worse than ever and this new round of $__,000,000,000 will finally fix it once and for all.

Voters approve like three quarters of these, and usually don't even remember we just gave them billions of dollars to fix the same thing a few years ago. I've heard plenty of people in my social circle who basically vote by reading the supposed purpose from the title ("Anti-Homelessness", "Schools", "High-speed rail", "Animal welfare") and they vote based entirely on the assumption that this proposition is the only and best way to help the homeless, improve schools, etc. They don't even entertain the idea that the prop might be a pork-filled piece of trash written by lobbyists that might even make the problems worse while costing eleven figures and still not be paid for in 20 years.

We just trust Sacramento so blindly.

[1] That, or the other alternative funding: A tax raise "on big corporations" which will 100% definitely not affect you, dear voter.

There are states which are worse, but don't get as much press coverage. Louisiana is essentially just a a US state controlled by petrochemical companies, so portions of the state have extreme rates of cancer.

California is just a population that tries to solve problems with maximal regulation and selective enforcement. So you get to see the effects. Here are some laws that I think the HN community would be hugely in favour of: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48652773

Yeah, I'd prefer to have an offline 3d printer but it seems I've made a mistake with my Bambu P1S.

Sometimes they do good. Prop 65 cleaned up off-gassing plastic products in the entire country. Harbor Freight stores used to be mini gas chambers leeching away your health.

Trampling on citizens rights is a luxury of the rich, but in this case it's an echo-chamber government ran by technocrats.

As an American, I’d say it’s far from the most “retarded” state. (I do agree this law is very bad)