DAN WALTERS: California an economic model of green prosperity? Not quite.

The contentions that going green has been an economic positive are unproven. The cheerleaders for that claim notoriously overcount “green jobs,” including many that would exist regardless and discounting the jobs that might be lost in the conversion.

The biggest negative about the state’s economic standing, however, came in a new report issued by the Census Bureau as Brown’s conference was underway.

It was the bureau’s updated report on poverty and once again, California found itself in the unenviable position of being No. 1 in that category when all economic factors are included in the calculation.

While the state’s poverty rate by the Census Bureau’s “supplemental” method declined slightly since the previous report, it still is the nation’s highest at 19 percent and that’s because of California’s very high cost of living, particularly for housing.

That means 7.5 million Californians, more than the population of most states, are counted as poor. And the situation is even darker when other data are put into the mix.

Going back at least to the New Deal, it’s been a Progressive conceit that the way to prosperity is to make everything more expensive.

“How’s that workin’ out for ya?” the wise woman once asked.