About eight minutes into his interview on Frank Beckmann's show yesterday, Cato fellow and Wall Street Journal columnist Stephen Moore expounded on the need for a Michigan right-to-work law:
I do a report every year with Arthur Laffer, the famous Reagan economist, called "Rich States, Poor States," where we rank the states from the most competitive to the least competitive. And Michigan was always, at best, in the middle of the pack. I think this will raise Michigan's competitiveness. You know, before you did this reform, as you know, Frank, Michigan had some of the highest taxes on small businesses of any state in the country, and I think this will make it a much more equitable system, much more pro-growth and will bring jobs.
A new study by Education Policy Director Mike Van Beek details the revenues and expenditures of every Michigan public school district over the last seven years and finds that schools in larger cities spend more per pupil than their rural counterparts, according to WSJM AM1400 in St. Joseph.
Research about health insurance for public school teachers by Education Policy Director Mike Van Beek is highlighted in today’s Livingston Daily Press & Argus editorial.
Van Beek found that in about half of the plans offered statewide, teachers pay nothing toward the cost of their own health insurance premiums, and that teachers pay an average of about 4 percent toward their premiums compared to 22 percent for the average Michigan employee.
Gongwer New Service reported last week that a new BlueGreen Alliance “Jobs21 Initiative” has been formed. The BlueGreen Alliance is comprised of labor and environmental activists who will promote green jobs as the promised path to economic prosperity. That’s bad news for Michigan workers because the BlueGreen Alliance has more to do with liberal politics than job creation.
Flint schools could save close to $4 million annually through extensive privatization of noninstructional services, according to The Flint Journal.
The Journal cited research by Center scholars that found 12 of 21 school districts in Genesee County outsourced food, transportation or custodial services. Statewide, nearly half of all public school districts do the same.
Today’s Detroit News editorial cites research by Education Policy Director Michael Van Beek and notes that “Schools aren’t hurting for money.”
Van Beek found that per-pupil spending for Michigan’s public schools was $11,661 in 2010, which is an all-time high.
A recent Michigan Capitol Confidential story about a Michigan school superintendent who wrote to Gov. Rick Snyder asking that his school be turned into a prison was cited by CNN.
The Bay City Times also wrote about the issue.
Every week, MichiganVotes.org sends a report on important or interesting votes and bills in the Michigan Legislature, and includes how each legislator voted. To find out who your state senator is and how to contact him or her go here; for state representatives go here.
Beating a self-imposed deadline by five days, the Michigan Legislature has passed a state budget with many notable spending cuts and an overall tax cut. The most significant and far-reaching change was to eliminate the Michigan Business Tax, replacing it with a much less complex and burdensome 6 percent Corporate Income Tax.
Some 88,000 people left Michigan in 2009, according to The Detroit News, a development that Fiscal Policy Director Mike LaFaive finds troubling.
“We’ve long been mortified at Michigan’s losses,” LaFaive told The News. “Every person who leaves may potentially be the next Berry Gordy or Will Kellogg.”
As previously reported,
A Michigan State professor who the university said committed plagiarism after the Mackinac Center raised questions about his work has been “released from university affiliation,” according to The State News.
Education Policy Director Mike Van Beek uncovered the problem after Sharif Shakrani wrote about school consolidation. Van Beek also noted that the study’s methodology was “seriously flawed.”
The Michigan Business Tax will soon be no more as Gov. Rick Snyder signed his tax reform package into law Wednesday. The bill replaces the Michigan Business Tax with a 6 percent corporate income tax. The state will also end its business tax credit regime, much of which created an unfair playing field for Michigan businesses.
If Michigan’s lawmakers really want to get out of the teachers union box and open up room for daring education reforms, they might want to check out what’s going on in Tennessee, where the Legislature has completely remade labor relations into something that hopefully can work for both teachers and students.
Property owners in the state may be in for an expensive surprise due to a federal government initiative they have probably never heard of, called the National Flood Insurance Program Map Modernization Initiative. The Federal Emergency Management Agency, in conjunction with the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality and county floodplain managers, are developing new floodplain maps.
An organization called Public Notice has assembled state fact sheets that outline budget and economic facts for all 50 states. Here's Michigan's:
Budget:
Economy:
Federal Government Spending:
Mike LaFaive addresses the latest complaints about cuts to Michigan’s film subsidy program and takes on the misinformation regarding its success in our Spotlight today.
Rep. Tom McMillin (R-Rochester) is currently seeking cosponsors in the Michigan House of Representatives for a bill he will introduce that would enroll Michigan in a multistate Health Care Compact. If approved by Congress, this would put the state in charge of all health care regulations and programs for its people, among other things exempting Michigan from ObamaCare’s mandates, including the one that forces every American to have health insurance. It would also turn over to the state Michigan’s share of federal Medicare and Medicaid spending.
Education Policy Director Michael Van Beek told WEYI-TV25 that “long-term structural changes” are needed in public education to “save Michigan financially.”
He addressed staffing cuts and health insurance costs as two areas that need attention. Van Beek also discussed common school funding myths at a forum in Lansing recently.
Two Mackinac Center scholars were cited in a recent Detroit News story on gas prices.
Dr. Ted Bolema, an adjunct scholar with the Center and director of the MBA program at South University in Novi, said inflation, which could top 5 percent this year, is a concern: “Incomes aren’t keeping pace at this point.”
In today’s Mount Pleasant Morning Sun is a column by Eric Baerren, the editor of the Michigan Liberal website and before that news editor of the Morning Sun itself. In it, he argues that business tax cuts don’t “drive” job creation because a “business doesn't look at its tax bill and say, "Hey, a break, we can hire more people."
According to a report in the Lansing political newsletter MIRS, environmental groups are hopping mad that the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality would give Wolverine Power a permit hearing regarding its application to build a coal-fired power plant near Rogers City.
Every week, MichiganVotes.org sends a report on interesting votes and bills in the Michigan Legislature, and includes how each legislator voted. To find out who your state senator is and how to contact him or her go here; for state representatives go here.
AnnArbor.com is reporting on a story that Michigan Capitol Confidential broke about 200 dependents of Ann Arbor Public Schools employees receiving improper health care benefits.
“How much is this happening all over the state,” asked Michael Van Beek, director of education policy. “It is just a flat out extra cost to taxpayers.
On Monday, former Michigan Carpenters President Ralph Mabry pleaded guilty to accepting kickbacks. The actual value of the kickbacks was modest, about $10,000 in charitable donations mainly, and one might be tempted to dismiss this as penny-ante stuff. That would be a mistake; Mabry's vulnerability to small bribes is liable to have a big price tag for unionized Michigan carpenters.
