Michigan's business, labor and regulatory climate must change if the state's economy is going to recover, Mike LaFaive, director of the Morey Fiscal Policy Initiative, explained today on "The Tony Conley Show" on WILS 1320AM in Lansing. You can listen to the interview at: http://www.webwiseforradio.com/site_files/368/Media/Tony/lafaive_08_12c.mp3
Michigan Public Radio recently turned to Education Policy Director Mike Van Beek to explain some of the issues surrounding funding for Michigan's public schools, which some seem to constantly claim are underfunded, despite evidence to the contrary.
Van Beek discussed his research on the costs of school health insurance plans, and has also examined some of the common myths about public school funding.
Michigan's share of the loot from the "edujobs" bill passed by Congress this week will be about $310 million. We're told that this will "save" 4,700 teacher jobs in Michigan. That's highly unlikely, for a couple of reasons.
First, most of the "4,700 layoffs" are administrative fictions, as explained here. Second, even if all 4,700 layoffs were real, the new money would divide out to $66,000 per teacher — but the teachers that districts hire back will almost certainly cost more than this.
President Obama, Gov. Granholm and much of the political class are misleading the public by leaving out key information when they say that the $26 billion state budgets bailout bill signed into law yesterday will reverse "thousands of teacher layoffs."
Special interest groups whose members' compensation comes from tax dollars are afraid that Michigan's economic crisis will impact their paychecks. They're right to be concerned since there is less private money left to pay generous public-sector salaries and benefits. Here's a reminder of the compensation gap between the two sectors.
Gov. Jennifer Granholm and Sen. Debbie Stabenow were quick to praise the new "edujobs" bill passed by the House Tuesday as part of a "stimulus II" package (and despite it lacking a legal title). Among other legislation it will dole out $310 million to Michigan public schools, with the hopes of "saving" 4,700 teacher jobs.
A new report by the Michigan League for Human Services bemoans the lack of tax money going to higher education. But the authors give a skewed view of appropriations, get some facts wrong, and completely miss the 800-pound gorilla of higher education: that increasing costs drive tuition increases.
Detroit Free Press columnist Stephen Henderson says Michigan needs the money that will come from the so-called 'edujobs' bill, but the state must also tackle the issue of school spending reform.
"Even more important, we're taking this money to retain teachers (an estimated 4,200) who are still not, on average, contributing near what they should be to their benefits packages," Henderson writes.
A number of pundits here and nationally have pointed to recent primary results as evidence that the Tea Party movement is ineffective or a failure. These analyses are flawed, because they are based on a conventional Republican vs. Democrat electoral politics worldview. This misses the Tea Party’s rejection of the entire ruling class establishment, including the major political parties as currently constituted.
Michigan residents can expect to pay significantly higher energy bills in the future due in large part to state law that requires that 10 percent of electricity sales in the state come from renewable sources, such as wind.
The Institute for Energy Research recently released a report titled "Energy Regulation in the States: A Wake-up Call," that found that states with binding renewable portfolio standards have electricity rates nearly 40 percent higher than states without renewable energy mandates. The higher rates in states with a renewable energy portfolio standard may not be entirely caused by the mandates, although there is a strong cause-and-effect relationship to renewable energy mandates and higher electricity rates.
In a lengthy article that covers most of the issues and angles pertaining to public school teacher compensation, the Michigan Education Association continued its perpetual campaign to obfuscate the facts about average teacher pay.
In response to the fact that the average Michigan teacher salary is 15 percent higher than the national average, the MEA said school employees have agreed to $1 billion in concessions over the last three years (a claim they've been repeating for almost a full year). This claim remains unproven, and in any event is irrelevant to a comparison of average teacher salaries. Even if there were a $1 billion worth of concessions, all of it could have come from non-teaching union members. The MEA uses this figure without differentiating teachers from non-teachers.
Gov. Jennifer Granholm's office and the Department of Human Services appear to be at odds over the classification of some 40,000 small-business owners who were forced into a union.
A spokeswoman for Granholm told the Washington Examiner that, "We do regard home-based childcare workers as public employees." DHS has previously insisted that the home-based day care owners are self-employed.
A recent USA Today story trumpets the alleged successes of taxpayer-subsidized state tourism programs, although it doesn't account for the cost of the programs and what could have been done with that money had it been left in the pockets of those who earned it.
Patrick J. Wright, director of the Mackinac Center Legal Foundation, was a guest on "The Frank Beckmann Show" on WJR 760AM this morning, discussing recent findings that point directly to Gov. Jennifer Granholm's role in the forced unionization of more than 40,000 small-business owners.
CNN is reporting that the U.S. Postal Service lost $3.5 billion in its most recent quarter. Are there alternatives? This Current Comment from August 2007 — the most popular item on the Mackinac Center's website that year — explores that issue.
The Legislature did not meet this week. Instead of votes, this report contains several newly introduced bills of interest.
Senate Bill 1441 (Allow Spartan Stores (but not competitors) to hold wine tastings)
Introduced by Sen. Mark Jansen (R) on July 28, 2010, to allow the Spartan Stores grocery chain (but not other grocery chains like Meijer, Kroger, etc.) to hold wine tastings in its stores.
The Mackinac Center has obtained a copy of a lawsuit today filed by the attorney for 11 contractors hired to perform work on a building now known as Hangar42. You can read the complaint by clicking here.
Hangar42 was supposed to be a functioning film studio run out of Walker, a suburb of Grand Rapids, thanks in-part to the state promise of an "assignable" tax credit worth $10 million. Gov. Jennifer Granholm bragged about this economic development deal in her State of the State address last February.
The Mackinac Center broke the story after a months-long investigation by Communications Specialist Kathy Hoekstra and myself that raised questions about the efficacy of the deal. In May we posted this essay and video with our findings. The research and reporting ultimately led to an Attorney General investigation and a criminal charge against the primary buyer of the studio, Joseph Peters.
The Mackinac Center has written extensively about the Michigan Film Office and the state's film subsidy program. For more information see "Special Effects: Flawed Report Provides Distorted Lens."
The average teacher salary in the St. Joseph Public Schools was $57,861 in 2009, and employees are not required to contribute anything to health insurance policies that cost the district some $11,400 annually. These are among the highlights in the current collective bargaining agreement negotiated between the district and the local arm of the Michigan Education Association union.
In a speech that careened from apologetic to apocalyptic before settling on anti-democratic, incoming UAW President Bob King addressed more of his ambitions for the union. Optimists who hope for a more business-savvy UAW will focus on the first half, in which he acknowledged some mistakes, in particular the “Jobs Banks” that kept laid-off autoworkers on company payrolls at nearly full salary, but realists will quickly recognize that the second half, in which King attempted to reclaim the union’s old economic and political clout, is what really matters.
How much background research does Michigan's corporate welfare bureaucracy actually perform on the potential recipients of its selective tax breaks and subsidies? Due to recent embarrassments the amount may be increasing, but until now the answer appears to be, "Not much at all."
The lead investor in a Grand Rapids-area film studio was in court Tuesday after being charged by the Michigan Attorney General's office with a felony relating to the deal.
As WZZM TV13 in Grand Rapids reports, the Mackinac Center "was the first to question the deal."
Most school districts are putting the finishing touches on next year's budget and anxiously awaiting word from Lansing about the exact dollar amount they'll get per pupil. While they're waiting, districts would be wise to give their teachers union contract a close look, since the bulk of school spending is absorbed by these employees.
The Michigan Attorney General's Office has filed a criminal charge against Joseph Peters, the primary investor in the Hangar42 film infrastructure tax credit/subsidy deal. The Mackinac Center in May was the first to raise questions about this deal after an investigation lasting several months. In June the Center was also first to call for a formal investigation. It must be noted that the filing of a criminal charge does not imply guilt.
While recently walking along the beach at the Traverse City State Park, I was appalled at how dirty the beach was. Among the litter and discarded cigarette buts it was difficult to find clean sand to sit on and enjoy the view of the bay. Perhaps part of the problem is there were no trash receptacles to be found anywhere in the area. What has happened to our state parks? The Lansing political class will claim it is a "lack of funding." In my observation, having worked in senior state park management positions in three different states - including a short stint as chief of Michigan State Parks - limited funds to manage state parks is a fact of life. Michigan doesn't need more funds for state parks, just better management of them.
