California Papers Over it Problems

Here is an excellent post by Felix Salmon that sums up how California has created yet another distinction between the "haves" and "have nots" of society:

People who get California IOUs	People California pays in cash
Grants to aged, blind or disabled persons	University of California
People needing temporary assistance for basic family needs	Public Employees’ Retirement System
People in drug prevention, treatment, and recovery services	Legislators, legislative employees, and appointees
Persons with developmental disablities	Judges
People in mental health treatment	Department of Corrections
Small Business Vendors	Health Care Services payments to Institutional Providers

Notice that the big shots, the elite, get paid in cash. The defenseless, the poor, are to be paid in IOUs and left with all the trouble of trying to cash them and vulnerable to being exploited by sharpsters who will "cash" the IOUs at a discount and walk off with a big slice of the money. It is just another example of the Marie Antoinette syndrome: the rich have no idea of how the poor live, so they they think nothing upon hearing that the people have no bread and are rioting to ask "but let them eat cake!" In the world of the rich, there are always special deals and insider treatment that makes sure they don't have to suffer. No nasty warrants or IOUs for them, just cash! Let the poor deal with that sticky unmanageable stuff. The poor have nothing but "time on their hands" so they won't find it a bother to try and eat paper IOUs or fix broken windows by pasting paper IOUs over the holes. Sad.