| Photo by Marcel Strauss on Unsplash
Part IX of “A Socioeconomic ‘Co-optopia'” Series
The two candidates for governor of California, Xavier Becerra and Steve Hilton, are allegedly opposed to a “Wealth Tax”. Because both think that the filthy-rich taxpayers will just relocate from California in order to avoid the new tax. And move the headquarters of their businesses as well, and eventually their factories to another state or overseas, where they could get tax breaks and tax avoidance benefits.
The Catholic Church can help promote the socioeconomic empowerment of their poor parishioners, especially the more-marginalized among them, by teaming up with local and state governments. And organizing cooperatives. Then a federation of co-ops can enter into private-and-public partnerships (PPP) with them and other private healthcare firms and foundations.
On June 22, 2025, this column discussed the topic of “Churches Can End ‘Avarician Economies’ By Doing ‘Cooperative Economics’.” It was Part X of “Fourteen Letters to His Holiness Pope Leo XIV” Series. It was sent through the Order of Saint Augustine Province of Santo Niño de Cebu in Cebu City, Philippines.
This columnist said in it: QUOTE. The “Wealth Tax” could have been the number-one issue of the 2024 presidential, congressional, and local elections. Neither of the major parties in the United States bothered to address the issues and suggest solutions. Apparently, American politicians cannot risk losing political contributions from Corporate America, their billionaire controlling shareholders, and other filthy-rich donors.
The term “crony capitalism” is generally attributed to George M. Taber, a former business editor for Time magazine. He is credited with using the term in the 1980s while researching the Philippine economy. Specifically, Taber wrote a Time article in 1980 with the headline “A Case of Crony Capitalism”. The term was used to describe the economic practices of that period, which involved close relationships between the government and certain businesses, resulting in preferential treatment and unfair advantages.
As this series (as addressed to Pope Leo XIV) stated in Part VII about the “Parishes of the Future”, the church must help congregations achieve socioeconomic empowerment by helping them form cooperatives. Poor parishioners seldom attend church activities like masses and novenas. Why? Because the primary worry of the poor is how to feed themselves; and it takes most of their time looking for food — especially if they ar>e homeless. UNQUOTE.
“The Catholic Church can help promote the socioeconomic empowerment of its poor parishioners, especially the more marginalized among them, by teaming up with local and state governments. And organizing cooperatives.”
Perhaps a California MediCare Consortium (CMCC) can attract private health-maintenance organizations (HMOs) and university hospitals, especially cancer institutes, to join it. This column will cite the example of Kaiser Permanente (KP) Foundation, which operates as a nonprofit health system.
Here are more information about Kaiser Permanente, which serves more-than 12.9 million members across eight states and the District of Columbia. It has12.9 million members served 243,652 employees in 609 medical offices. Among its employees are 25,505 physicians and 78,630 nurses in 40 hospitals.
Kaiser Permanente reported a $9.3 billion net income on $127.7 billion in consolidated revenue in 2025. While its actual operations generated an operating income of $1.4 billion (a 1.1% margin), the bulk of the net bottom-line profit was driven by investment returns and favorable financial markets. Because Kaiser Permanente operates as a nonprofit health system, it reinvests its overall net margins back into patient care, community benefits, technology, and capital projects.
As stated in Part VI, there are nearly 11 million Catholics in California, making it the state with the largest Catholic population in the United States. They represent roughly 26% to 30% of the state’s entire population and are spread across 12 dioceses and archdioceses. The Catholic presence in California is highly organized and expansive. It has1,073 parishes statewide and organized under two archdioceses (in Los Angeles and San Francisco) and 10 dioceses. There are also 41 Catholic hospitals and 36 healthcare centers.
There are many benefits if both the Catholic Church of California, the Kaiser Permanente Foundation, and other similar entities, can join forces with the State of California and its millions of current and retired employees. The next column will discuss the positive results of a PPP among the the said entities. The first is the Economies of Scale, which is one of the most-important concepts in modern economics. It can lower average cost of medical care and enhances competitiveness, especially since it will operate under the tenets of Cooperative Economics.
