The Detroit News on Saturday published an article in which reporter Ron French compiled various indicators to suggest that Michigan state government is smaller now than at the start of this decade (“Michigan’s shrinking government”).
There are various ways to measure this, and one used by Mr. French was to compare total state spending in Fiscal Year 2008-2009 — the fiscal year just ended on Sept. 30 — to the year "2000." The article did not specify whether that meant fiscal Year 1999-2000 or calendar year 2000, so I called and asked. Mr. French told me the comparison was to FY 2000-2001, which only included three months of calendar year 2000.
Transparency, spending, health care and the state's budget process were the topics of several media stories involving the Mackinac Center in the last few days.
The Center's efforts to convince every public school, municipality and legislator in the state to post spending online were highlighted in a story Friday in the Midland Daily News and an editorial Sunday in The Detroit News. WNEW-TV5 in Saginaw also covered the issue.
Disguised as “reform,” numerous health care proposals are finding support in Congress. The result is a mishmash of plans that do little to improve access, quality or cost. There are at least 10 criteria that provide a foundation for reform.
Fifty percent of the nation's health care costs are attributable to lifestyle, such as smoking, alcohol abuse, improper diet, lack of exercise, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Lesson: Reform must include incentives for changing behavior.
By Jack McHugh
Some ObamaCare proponents have claimed that the Mackinac Center's YouTube videos documenting the human cost of Canadian doctor shortages are off base, because the bills in Congress don't create the same system as Canada's. They are both right and wrong - the bills would create a system different in its details, but one with the same dysfunctions, generated by reproducing here the same skewed incentives.
Since April 2008, Michigan has given qualified film productions up to 42 cents on the dollar for every expense they incur in the state. While the state is able to point to a number of films and projects given assistance from this program, the state's motion production and sound recording industries employ fewer people now than when the subsidy began.
A news report from Detroit TV station WDIV seems to indicate that a $146 million film production studio has instead become a boondoggle for the city of Allen Park. The official news release from the governor's office touted that Unity Studios would create up to "121 new jobs" initially, then as many as 3,000 new jobs when the facility is "at full operation." Backers also boasted it would include "a village where people can live, shop and find entertainment options" at the proposed 104-acre site on the privately owned land that once housed the Visteon Technical Center.
Michelle Malkin said it best when she said, "The Culture of Corruption has never hit so close to home."
The prominent author, blogger and commentator was referring in a recent blog post to a shady scheme to shanghai Michigan's home day care providers into a newly-formed, dues-paying labor union. Last month, the Mackinac Center Legal Foundation exposed this scheme in its first lawsuit, Loar v. DHS. A Mackinac Center news release explains the Sept. 16 filing:
Frank Beckmann, host of "The Frank Beckmann Show" on WJR AM760, cited the Mackinac Center in his weekly Detroit News column today.
He referenced a study by Paul Kersey, director of labor policy for the Center, that found Michigan's public schools could save about $250 million a year if the state's prevailing wage law was overturned.
This chart might be called the "Political Class Desperation Index." The need for transformational reform of Michigan's tax, spending, labor and regulatory environments is indicated by the skyrocketing unemployment rate. The failure of the political class to buck special interests — including government employee unions — and finally undertake those reforms makes its members increasingly desperate to create the appearance of "doing something." Thus the massive increase in futile picking of winners (and losers) for receipt of discriminatory tax breaks and subsidies. These create diversionary "feel good" stories for local newpapers, but do nothing to reverse the state's economic decline — and may even accelerate it. ("MEGA" is the flagship program of Michigan's bureaucratic "economic development" empire.)
I am a registered nurse at Genesys hospital near Flint, where the RNs and licensed practical nurses who do direct patient care are represented by the Teamsters. I believe the union-fostered attitude at our hospital works against teamwork. While Genesys is a great place to work, it would be even better if the union acted more professionally.
The Michigan Economic Growth Authority, the state's lead business incentive program, is primed for new amendments to raise the cap on the number of credits it can award this year. While there are some good transparency efforts in the bill, the state would be better served by eliminating the program and lowering taxes for every business.
The strong economy bore its fruits Tuesday as lawmakers happily allocated hundreds of millions for needs in the health and welfare budgets while passing out other money to cultural institutions around the state.
Few legislators sounded any objections to the $321.6 million general fund bill ($530.6 million from all sources) as it passed HB 4075 on an 89-13 vote, but there were some complaints about "pork-barrel" spending for pet projects.
This week, The Wall Street Journal published another critical examination of Michigan's political leadership, economy and budget. In a delicious irony, the online version posted a Michigan Economic Development Corp. advertisement (click on the image at right to enlarge) featuring actor Jeff Daniels alongside the piece.
A roundup of recent Mackinac Center media citations.
Paul Kersey, director of labor policy, was cited in the Detroit Free Press regarding a push in Oakland County to pass a prevailing wage ordinance. Kersey's 2007 study on the issue showed that Michigan's prevailing wage law increased costs needlessly, especially for public schools.
Forty-five percent of registered voters rated the economy as the most important issue in deciding their vote if the congressional election were held today, according to a news story in Politico; only 4 percent ranked climate change as the top issue. The poll conducted by Public Strategies Research Practice Group, a business advisory firm located in Austin, Texas, is consistent with other recent polling that shows global climate change low on the priority list of most Americans.
The Detroit Free Press is reporting that the City of Detroit has stopped collecting dues on behalf of 16 unions that have yet to reach new agreements with the city of Detroit. This is a provocative but much-needed step that serves to discipline city employee unions. While exact numbers of employees covered are not available, this action covers AFSCME, one of the largest unions in city government which covers several bargaining units, as well as the Amalgamated Transit Union representing city bush drivers. The city sent notice of its intentions back on October 9, giving the unions involved 10 days to agree to terms.
The Michigan "Legislative Commission on Government Efficiency" has released a draft of its final recommendations that fully meets the expectations raised by the "overarching conclusions" that were the subject of a post on this blog two days ago. (Short version: "Bureaucratic gobbledygook won't fix Michigan.")
The Bureau of Labor Statistics today released the September state-by-state unemployment rates. Michigan remains the highest in the country at 15.3 percent unemployment. This is the 43rd month in a row that Michigan has been the worst state for finding a job.
Cigarette smuggling and student achievement drew two recent media mentions for Mackinac Center scholars.
An Op-Ed on cigarette smuggling by Michael LaFaive, director of fiscal policy, and Todd Nesbit, a Penn State professor and adjunct scholar with the Center, appeared in the Providence (Rhode Island) Journal. The piece pointed out that states that raise or have high tobacco taxes also have higher rates of cigarette smuggling.
The Michigan "Legislative Commission on Government Efficiency" has come out with a set of "overarching conclusions" that includes this gem:
Cross-cutting and underlying principles are the foundation of our recommendations
— Look to optimize across all levels and units of government
— Address underlying structural issues
— Be holistic in the approach (look at all aspects of the budget and government operations)
— Create a roadmap to fiscal stability
— Be of sufficient magnitude to make a difference
Another home-based day care owner forced into a union has been highlighted by the media.
The Mackinac Center Legal Foundation filed a lawsuit in mid-September on behalf of two other day care operators who faced the same fate after the Michigan Department of Human Services and Mott Community College formed a "shell corporation" for the purpose of siphoning union dues from state child care subsidy checks meant to help low-income families. Some 40,000 home-based day care providers are affected, with about $3.7 million being redirected to the UAW and AFSCME.
Gov Jennifer Granholm has actually outdone the Mackinac Center with a cost saving measure enacted on Monday. Specifically, she line-item vetoed the so-called "Section 20(j)" appropriation in the Fiscal Year 2009-2010 K-12 School Aid Budget, which would have granted $54 million to 51 particular school districts that tend to be wealthier ones, with some exceptions.
Last friday I received the following email message from the Detroit Tigers:
TIGERS NEWS ALERT
October 16, 2009
VOICE YOUR OPINION ABOUT THE TICKET TAX
Dear Tigers fans,
As you may have heard by now, the Governor and the Michigan Legislature are seriously considering charging sports fans a 6-percent luxury tax on all professional and college sports tickets sold in Michigan.
A new study by the Center's Michael LaFaive, director of fiscal policy, and James Hohman, fiscal research analyst, figured prominently in media coverage across Michigan Sunday and today highlighting Michigan's inability to create jobs, despite various programs, subsidies and other give-aways.
Among the forms of posturing by the political class is for its members to wrap themselves in a mantle of virtue by imposing the tenets of the latest trendy or politically correct social movement on students and others.* Nowhere is the sanctimony more evident than in propagating "green" orthodoxy. Sometimes this carries real economic consequences, such as recent laws imposing new recycling fees on computer makers, permit requirements for groundwater use and higher electricity rates to pay for mandated levels of "renewable" energy generation.
