Michigan residents continue to flee the Great Lake State and are doing so at a near-record rate, according to one vital measure. The implications of this diaspora — or dispersion — of our residents across America are staggering. (more ...)
Friday, December 14, 2007
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
8 comments:
A state employee emailed the following feedback on this article to the Mackinac Center's general mailbox:
"If Indiana's so great, why haven't you guys moved there?"
This particular government employee is paid an annual salary of $65,876. The typical benefits package for a state employee in Michigan adds approximately 56 percent to their total compensation. Therefore, taxpayers are paying this individual more than $100,000 annually, part of which has gone to complaining about the work of an organization that is pointing out that Michigan has an unsustainable government establishment, and that the cost of propping it up is hollowing out the private economy of the state.
Note: In a private sector organization that is subject to the forces of competition it's no one's business what a particular employee earns - the market will determine whether the pay is appropriate. In the public sector these matters are ultimately determined by politics, rather than by the voluntary transactions of sellers and buyers who have a choice whether to pay or not. Therefore, this information becomes relevent in debates such as the one underway in this state.
Jack McHugh
Mackinac Center for Public Policy
Michigan's experience underscores that people will, over the long term, go where the jobs are. While keeping the existing population employed is a noble goal, the whole notion of communities competing for population growth is foolhardy. More people means higher expenses and a host of environmental and quality of life challenges.
While a contracting population certainly creates challenges in terms of house values and vacant, overbuilt infrastructure, the author fails to see the forest for the trees. The purpose of local govt. in Michigan is to meet the basic needs of the residents. Fewer residents should mean lower costs.
Fewer residents also means a decline in greenhouse gas emissions, less traffic congestion and smog, and more sustainable levels of resource extraction.
Using something like GDP as a measure of your success will mislead you. No one on his deathbed wishes he'd experienced a little higher GDP during his years on Earth. Quality of life begins with clean air to breathe, a healthy non-toxic environment, and the knowledge that your grandchildren will not have to pay the price for the prosperity you enjoyed.
Of course, profiteers who want their businesses to benefit from a growing market, will see this glass as half empty.
Dave Gardner
Producer/Director
Hooked on Growth: Our Misguided Quest for Prosperity
www.growthbusters.com
Dave Gardner’s thoughtful comment very civilly presents the competing viewpoint in the debate now underway in Michigan. He is correct in suggesting that the current policy directions taken by Michigan state government will drive down the state’s population by driving out what he calls "profiteers" - investors, entrepreneurs and private sector employers. He states that this is his policy preference. Fair enough.
If the members of the current political establishment wish to base their election campaigns on explicitly promising policies that “protect” the environment by driving down the private economy and force residents to go elsewhere, they should do so, and I for one would welcome their candor. I suspect that a few lawmakers actually do believe this, and that in a few districts they could actually get elected on this "Green Party" platform.
A very few districts. It’s very unlikely that the majority of Michigan voters agree that driving down the private economy to depopulate the state is the proper role of government. Honesty requires legislators who do not explicitly campaign on this platform to not legislate on it once they are in office. Consciously or not, that’s just how they are legislating now.
Well, using the phrase "drive down the economy" reveals a certain bias - toward the belief that more economic throughput is a desirable goal. I'm proposing it may be time to examine that.
And I am not proposing the state should try to drive people out; just that the state might want to look at the bright side. After all, rising populations come with many externalized costs - transit subsidies, school tax subsidies, utilities and transportation infrastructure subsidies, to name a few. A recent addition to that list is investments in programs to reduce carbon emissions.
Isn't the real purpose of an economy to provide a means for people to exchange specialized services to that everyone's needs are met? If you have fewer people, then your economy doesn't need to be as big.
So I'm not suggesting the state drive people away, but I am suggesting that attracting population may not be the best or the only solution to the problems facing the state.
This is called thinking outside the box. And I wouldn't expect those who just want more customers for their business to be motivated to do that.
Thanks for the civil discourse!
Dave Gardner
Producer/Director
Hooked on Growth: Our Misguided Quest for Prosperity
www.growthbusters.com
Gardner should be pleased with thi latest news, and the House Fiscal Agency shouldn't have to look any further than the "Michigan's Diaspora" article to figure out where the children went.
It's gonna get lonesome in this state - I miss the kids already.
:(
MIRS News, Dec. 14, 2007
from "Where Did They Go?"
When they put the K-12 budget to bed, they assumed 15,000 fewer students would register in Michigan. Turns out they were right and then some.
Preliminary numbers indicate another 10,000 on top of that failed to answer the bell on the first day of school. That means an extra savings to the state of $75 million and an unexpected loss to the schools.
“You wonder where they are all going?” wonders Tom WHITE from the Michigan School Business Officers group. That's the same question they are researching at the House Fiscal Agency, which confirmed the enrollment drop-off for MIRS.
It is known that the Detroit School system lost 10,000 students and that was anticipated.
Of course the states with lower wages, benefits, not to mention anti-worker laws, have more corporations packing up u-hauls and moving. It's the same reason China's booming too (as well as anti-worker violence, but that's another messy story we'll ignore for now).
Duh.
And in regards to the government employee making $65...what's his/her degree? I see a lot of people badmouthing government workers, teachers, etc. but I haven't yet seen anyone dare offer a figure they think is "acceptable" for people with bacherlor, master, and phds to make--other than a yearning for a darwinistic culling of people, wages, and benefits that the benevolent "free market" fairly and judiciously applies to everyone.
Trouble is, the corporate mindset wants it both ways in this country: they want wages and benefits slashed--but they also want the same workers they would pummel every chance they could to buy, buy, buy, buy, buy, buy, buy: you need 2 vehicles, not one; you need 3 bathrooms not 2 (lol at 1). Buy, buy, buy, buy, buy.
During WWII my grandparents scrimped, sacrificed, and saved. What was Bush's message after 9-11? Buy, buy, buy, buy, buy.
And another thing: there is no such thing as this mythical "private sector versus public sector." When a state government gives millions and millions of dollars in tax cuts and rebates and whatever else to PRIVATE businesses, they are no more no less "private" than any other government-funded programs.
But let's not make big business mad! God knows they're looking for any excuse to open sweat shops overseas.
Worth asking a second time: what should a state employee with a bachelor's or master's or phd make in salary and benefits that would be OKAY with the Mackinac Center and those who think like they do?
*crickets chirping*
I guess it's just a lot easier to badmouth what these people make instead of offering a figure on what it should be...by simply complaining, it serves its rhetorical purpose: create envy and jealousy and strife within the good workers of Michigan and thus better control them.
This is intelligent discourse. Well conceived and presented. One thing missing: What is the effect of Detroit's mayor's situation, his insistence on remaining in office ("to serve the city"), and the governor's lack of decisiveness (in fact, lack of ANYTHING except refuge in her fuhrer bunker) on population/commercial investment in Michigan? Does that send a signal that Michiganians refuse to deal with their refuse? Speaks to garbage collection at the highest levels. I sure wouldn't want to live in a smelly place like that...and don't.
Post a Comment