A bipartisan coalition of government, business, labor and housing advocates seems to think so. Glaring holes in the coalition's strategy, however, include the absence of a conservation or environmental group and the lack of a direct role for employers who create the jobs.
Job creation is largely responsible for the state's housing crisis.
The influx comes at a time when the state is woefully short of housing by hundreds of thousands of homes. The California Association of Realtors recently reported housing affordability in California dropped from 40 percent in 1998 to 37 percent in 1999, the lowest it's been since 1992, when it was 32 percent. The affordability index is the percentage of families that can afford the median priced home. Some San Francisco Bay Area counties face near record-low affordability index rates below 20 percent. That rate, however, is likely lower.