COLUMN - After the gold rush, California finds thrift: James Saft

-- James Saft is a Reuters columnist. The opinions expressed are his own --

By James Saft

LONDON (Reuters) - As it did when the housing bubble began to burst, California is leading the way in the next leg: a consumer bust.

Squeezed by rising unemployment, inflation in food and energy costs and plunging house prices, Californians are cutting back on spending. Besides causing woes for state and local government, this is giving California's economy another knock and makes further job losses, home repossessions and banking problems more likely.

The figures are pretty bad. The median home price has fallen by 29 percent in the year to March, according to the California Association of Realtors, and repossessions are surging. Unemployment has risen by 24 percent, to 6.2 percent, in the same period.

But most importantly, in the 10 months to the end of April sales tax receipts in California are actually down in absolute terms. Gasoline tax receipts are essentially flat. When you factor in that there would have been considerable inflation during the period, and that some essentials like gasoline will have risen sharply in cost, the picture is clear: Californians are tightening their belts.

And California matters. It accounts for 13 percent of U.S. GDP. It was also where more than a third of the non-mainstream home loans such as subprime and Alt-A were made in 2006 and 2007, making it very important to the health of the banking system.

"California is big enough that it is going to drag a lot of the nation down with it," said Christopher Thornberg of Beacon Economics consultancy in Los Angeles.

"You can't have collapsing consumer demand in California and not expect it to have an influence."