From Amazon, Instacart and Netflix to the Atlantic, Salesforce, Zoom and more, the private sector came through with flying colors for consumers during the pandemic, but the opposite has been the case for consumers of California’s government services, which weren’t good even before the pandemic. That’s because government services in California are run for the benefit of providers instead of consumers, and that’s because lawmakers accept donations from unions, associations and corporations whose members, shareholders and employees profit from providing government services. Every year, CA lawmakers direct more than $300 billion to political-donors-cum-providers of public services who treat 40 million consumers of those services like vassals. The solution is to ban donations from providers. The consumer, not the provider, should be on the throne.
