Daily Business Report: Monday, May 19, 2025
CA Department of Insurance: A Warning Shot to Every Free Market Believer
By Stacy Korsgaden | California Globe
Californians are waking up to a hard truth: the Department of Insurance, bloated and broken, has become a hostile force in the state’s economy. Under the failed leadership of Commissioner Ricardo Lara, this out-of-control bureaucracy has devastated the insurance market and driven the state to the edge of collapse.
What was once a department designed to foster fairness and oversight has morphed into a political weapon: slow-moving, expensive, and utterly disconnected from reality. It no longer serves consumers. It punishes businesses, bullies carriers, and micromanages private industry into submission. The result is chaos, uncertainty, and a chilling message to every company watching from the sidelines: stay out of California.
After the worst wildfire disaster in our nation’s history, State Farm, the largest insurer in America, requested a 22% rate increase to cover unprecedented risk and surging reinsurance costs. The Department said no. Why? Because optics and politics matter more than solvency. When a watered-down 17% was finally approved, it was too little, too late. And when State Farm asked for another 30% in 2024, the Department brushed it aside, promising to “review it” sometime in 2025. They still haven’t.
Why San Diego Unified Trustee Richard Barrera Wants to Be State Supe
By Jakob McWhinney | Voice of San Diego
Richard Barrera has an almost mythic status in San Diego County. He’s San Diego Unified’s longest-serving board member and has been at the center of many of the biggest changes at the district – from its labor-friendly shift to the hiring of Superintendent Cindy Marten, who President Joe Biden later made deputy superintendent of the U.S. Department of Education.
In his nearly 20 years as a trustee, Barrera’s progressive views have come to dominate the board, while his deep ties to unions have on more than one occasion led to cries of conflict of interest for the former Labor Council leader.
The district has also steadily risen to become one of the top performing large urban districts in the country, according to metrics like nationwide test scores.
But earlier this month, Barrera announced he was setting his sights higher. He declared he was running to be California’s superintendent of public education.
Alzheimer’s research at risk as diagnoses rise
By Kate Murphy, Carly Mallenbaum | Axios San Diego
More than 7 million American seniors now live with Alzheimer’s disease — the highest number ever recorded, according to 2025 data shared in a new Alzheimer’s Association report.
Why it matters: As Alzheimer’s diagnoses rise, the federal funding for medical research that’s critical to preventing and treating it is at risk of being cut.
State of play: Over 17,300 Californians die from Alzheimer’s every year, but addressing cognitive decline early can help stave off the disease.
- That’s especially important with San Diego County’s growing senior population — about 16% of residents.
Zoom in: The odds of being diagnosed with Alzheimer’s is higher in San Diego than many other parts of the country, at least in part because of the local hospital system.
