Whenever someone gets around to cataloging lame-brained political ideas, Calif. Gov. Gavin Newsom’s decision to pass out free burner phones to CEOs in the state will forever top the list.

Newsom has so far sent roughly 100 cellphones – with his direct line programmed in – to CEOs with a message that “if you ever need anything, I’m a phone call away.”

“This was the governor’s idea to connect more directly with business leaders in the state,” spokesperson Izzy Gardon said.

More accurately, it’s Newsom’s attempt to keep still more corporations from joining the well over 350 companies who’ve left the state since 2018, and the million-plus Californians who followed them out the door.

Well, we looked into it, and we couldn’t find a single corporate executive – or individual – who said they would have stayed put if only they had a Newsom burner phone.

Instead, they said things like “taxes are too high,” or “regulations are too stringent,” or “the cost-of-living is punishing,” or “the schools suck,” or “I’m tired of being robbed.” The state’s criminal wildfire negligence hasn’t helped either.

When Stanford University’s Hoover Institution looked into why so many companies were leaving the state, they found that “several economic factors that have led to these departures by raising business costs, reducing productivity, and reducing profitability, including tax policies, regulatory policies, labor costs, litigation costs, energy and utility costs, and concerns about a declining quality of life within the state.”

Indeed, by almost any ranking of business friendliness, California is at or near the bottom of the list.

• The state ranks 48^th in Tax Foundation’s Business Tax Climate Index, with only New York and New Jersey fairing worse.
• Chief Executive magazine’s survey of CEOs finds them ranking California dead last.
• California comes in 47^th place in CNBC’s ranking of business friendliness and 45^th in the cost of doing business.
• ALEC-Laffer State Economic Competitiveness Index ranks California 47^th for economic competitiveness.

There are any number of other such rankings that show California at the bottom of the barrel on taxes, regulations, and the cost of doing business.

Does Newsom honestly believe that handing out a burner phone will make up for years of aggressively anti-business policymaking?

So, here’s an idea for Gov. Newsom. Instead of handing out free phones to CEOs, why not hand out free brochures to your leftist comrades in government explaining the facts of life to them.

To wit: If you tax and regulate businesses to death in the name of leftist causes, companies will leave, along with their jobs and their tax payments.

— Written by the I&I Editorial Board