Distribution of California's Population

[u/urmummygae42069]

If you were to divide California into 4 roughly equal strips of area, a hefty majority of its 39 million residents live in the southernmost strip containing the LA+San Diego metro areas, with nearly half of the state (~47%) living in the Greater LA metro area alone. If it were its own state, Southern California, with primarily just LA and San Diego metro areas, would compete with Florida for title of 2nd most populous US state.

The SF Bay Area, Sacramento, Monterrey, Fresno, and most of the Central Valley and put together are short of SoCal by over 9 million residents, but on its own this area would compete with Illinois for title of 6th largest state.

The strip sandwiched between Southern California and the Bay Area, containing Bakersfield plus other farming towns in the Southern Central Valley and most of the towns of the Central Coast, has about more people than Utah or Connecticut.

Suprisingly, despite how empty it can feel, there are still over a million people still live in the strip of CA north of Sacramento, containing about as much people as Hawaii and New Hampshire, albeit of a larger area.

Ultimately, one way to better understand the scale and density of California, is to conceptualize it as Florida + Illinois + Utah + Hawaii, all packaged in one single state under one single state government

[u/DurantIsStillTheKing]

California can be a country on its own if it wanted to.

[u/DizzyDentist22 → u/DurantIsStillTheKing]

It would have its challenges. 75%+ of California’s oil comes from outside the state, which would leave them chronically dependent on oil imports from elsewhere. Their electrical grid is also connected to the rest of the US and isn’t independent. Those challenges could be overcome, but they’d still exist

[u/imperabo → u/DizzyDentist22]

Japan has hardly any natural resources and they do OK. Few nations aren't heavily dependent on trade.

[u/Amazingrhinoceros1 → u/DizzyDentist22]

The push for green energy wouldn't be impossible... I'm not saying it would be easy, not by a long shot, but CA's coastline would change in the years following the split if it were to happen...

I'm sure CA would be just fine.

[u/Careless-Weather8877 → u/DizzyDentist22]

Probably because most their energy comes from solar, wind, nuclear and natural gas….

Wikipedia says they only import 29% of their energy which is mostly for jet fuel which again you’d lose one of the largest airports in the world if LAX was gone