Muskegon Cash Mob Gets Mention in Wall Street Journal

This here is the Wall Street Journal right here...AND a friend of mine who made it happen:

Similar cash mobs have materialized in more than 20 cities from Norman, Okla., to Muskegon, Mich., most arranged by individuals who establish followings on Facebook and Twitter. The cash-mob organizers don't get any benefit in return.

I don't know where to start. I'm so freakin' proud of my friend. Known her since we were kids growing up in the same church.

We founded a group called the West Michigan Jobs Group, which championed an offshore wind farm. This friend of mine, she's the Vice President of the West Michigan Jobs Group and she, among many others, worked tirelessly and without a cent of payment to raise support and awareness for renewable energy and a new industry in West Michigan. We successfully helped lure a 100 MW wind farm to the Waste Water Treatment Facility. This friend of mine...She and I, we've known each other since we were small kids in bible school at the same Slovak church.

Now I don't want to go claiming that her actions are mine, or ours. Her actions are hers. And they've made a difference in a small corner of America. And got National Attetnion. But she's one of Us. She's dedicated to making her town a better place to live.

She organized a Cash Mob that brought people to a little known part of our community, and has helped independent businesses raise awareness of what they do, and bring traffic to an economically hard-hit part of our community.

What's a Cash Mob?

It's a large, organized descent on an independent business to raise awareness of it, bring people to an under-served and under-represented part of the city.

The boys and I attended the cash mob in a particularly hard-hit part of Muskegon. And while there we discovered in the same area an Asian market where we can buy some well priced miso soup mix that my older seven year old son loves, and some tiny red hot peppers that I love, some delicious wasabi peas, and mung-bean cakes, and noodles. And of course, a restaurant called Mia and Grace which serves mostly locally made foods, down to the ketchup which is made in the store from locally grown ingredients. All along this little strip on 3rd street in a place I rarely visit......

...the Cash Mob brought me there. And I learned about a completely new region of the city.

Awesome.

Bravo, friend and VP of the West Michigan Jobs Group.

We are TOTALLY going to drag this hard-hit region out of hardship and obscurity. We're so freakin' sick of things being hard.

"I Hear the Store is Saving Money."

GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!

"WAIT...they're paying you minimum wage?"

"I'm up for a raise soon." The young attendant at the Meijer self checkout took my embarrassing, late night grocery store rant in good humor.

"But...WAIT...wait...they're paying you MINIMUM WAGE?"

"A-yup."

I had just spent the past 15 minutes at the massive supermarket, trying to find a cat flea medicine that was actually priced as labeled on the shelf: "But....but....who on earth is benefiting from this new No Price Tag law thing, then?"

"I hear it saves the store money."

"Are they at least hiring more people?"

"No, I think the cut back the hours of the stock guys."

AAAARRGH!

"So....I just spent 15 minutes hunting down cat flea stuff that matched the marked price because of a law that saves the store money and the store isn't hiring more people, you're paid minimum wage to hear some guy rant at the checkout at 10 PM, and I'm STILL seeing my grocery bill go up...."

"Sorry." The young woman shrugged.

"No...no....it's not your fault. I'm sorry. I'm...I'm just ranting. Just being an ass. You know...I'd be a little better with it if I knew the folks here were at least paid more than minimum wage."

"I'm up for a raise soon!" The young woman smiled again.

"I hope it's huge. Okay...well, have a good night. Thanks for helping me get this cat stuff thing figured out."

-----> Michigan was sort of spoiled for the longest time. We had an excellent law that required stores to price each item individually, so that people could quickly and easily compare prices against the scan price at the checkout. The whole point was to give consumers as much information about their purchase as possible.

I never realized how much I USED those price tags until they were gone. Recently our Governor and conservative congress scrapped the consumer protection law, under the guise of "saving stores money" so those savings would get "passed on to the consumer" or "used to hire new workers."

But...so far none of that has happened. All it's done is make people wander around the store trying to find out how much their purchases are supposed to cost. Meanwhile, nobody is getting raises, consumer prices aren't going any lower, and stores slashed hours for stock clerks.

Great.

I was going to buy halloween candy at Meijer a few weeks ago, and went to the candy bin where a big yellow sign read "2 for $5". I reached in, grabbed a bag, went to the checkout...it scanned for $15! GRRR...went back...found another "2 for $5" bin....that bag scanned for $8.

I finally asked a guy chucking candy into the bins "Are those 2 for $5?" He looked at the sign and pulled it off..."no..."

Nobody wins with this law change.

Well.....I take that back. As the young woman said "I hear the store is saving money." Trickle down economics at work.

Michigan Republicans Raise Taxes on Low Wage Earners By $1000 per Year

I suppose I should be talking about this since it's on my beat, though Wizardkitten has an excellent diary about the Republican tax raises in Muskegon.

As it turns out, our Conservative representatives gleefully stripped downtown Muskegonites of the tax free Renaissance zone. The tax free Renaissance zone was set up to help a LITERALLY demolished city center lure people and businesses downtown to have a city center again. For some reason a tax free Renaissance zone was far too libertarian for our Tea Party congress so they...

...oh who am I kidding?

They stripped the tax free zone because there were mostly just poor poeple living there, and who gives a crap about them, right? Am I right?

Of course I'm right.

The Ren zone was mostly populated by low wage earners. If you're making 25,000 in downtown Muskegon, guess what? The Michigan Republicans raised your taxes by $1000 per year!

Classy.

You'd think our State Senator Goeff Hansen would have given a crap...but he still gleefully rubber stamped the bill.

GLEEFULLY.

As did our State representative Holly Hughs.

Gleefully.

They GLEEFULLY signed that bill. With gusto.

The very same bill that stripped young families of the state Child Tax Credit.

Folks are asking me all the time now, like they've JUST heard about it, "Is it true that we're losing the child tax credit this year?

I'm happy to tell them who punched their young family in the gut. Happy to tell them that Goeff Hansen and Holly Hughs JOYFULLY rubber stamped the bill that is raising their taxes by HUNDREDS and in some cases a THOUSAND dollars.

Middle class taxes: raised
Child tax credits for young families: scrapped
Food assistance: slashed
Help for the poorest citizens: retroactively slashed
Pensions: Taxed
Schools, police, fire departments: slashed

All to splash MORE and MORE and MORE money on the folks who don't seem to be hiring anybody right now. But I'm sure they're paying out some mad cash to Hansen and Hughs.

It can't be more direct. We're robbing regular Americans to give to the rich.

As Unemployment Climbs Again, Michigan's Assistance Programs are Eviscerated

It's a beautiful day. Little drizzly, little overcast, slight fog, but warm. It's a lazy, relaxing early autumn. There's a cricket chirping outside the open window.

It's the time of year again when I get to feel sanctimonious about the deals I get on apples at the farmer's market. Yesterday I picked up a half bushel of macintosh apples for $6 - crisp and sweet with a little tart. I tend to go for the apple seconds with minor blemishes. Dark spots.

I should not be looking at unemployment figures today.

Non-farm jobs in Muskegon are at the same levels they were at in 1995 -- 16 years ago. U3 unemployment is Muskegon is back to the 12% range again. I was feeling pretty good earlier this year and late last year. We were backing away from the near 16% unemployment mark we were at in January 2010. In April 2011, at 10.1% unemployment, it looked like we might actually drop below double digit unemployment for the first time in 30 months.

Now we're on to month 34, and seeing a rise in the unemployment level again.

Except now, instead of seeing more help for those struggling to get by, we're seeing Lansing and DC stripping help for people. Michigan's unemployment benefits have been slashed from 26 weeks to 20 weeks, even as people are well into their third year of unemployment. The State level heating assistance fund for individuals is nearly empty and the state has not moved to fund it.

A pittance of cash assistance for those most in need has been retroactively slashed to 48 months, leaving 11,000 of Michigan's poorest citizens without a means to get by with necessities like housing, clothing, utilities, toiletries starting within the week.

And even as food banks are running empty, the state of Michigan is making food assistance more restrictive and raising the eligibility standards.

Michigan has slashed child tax credits for families, removed primary residence tax credits that benefitted the middle class, and are now taxing pensions for those who held up their part of the worker contract.

As our economy moves in the wrong direction, our programs to help low income people and the rising number of people dropping out of the Middle Class do too.

Meanwhile, the wealthiest businesses continue to see their taxes cut...and as most of the housing market tanks, luxury housing sales continue to climb.

This time, 15% unemployment is going to hurt a lot more.

Michigan's Jobs Plan: Boot 30,000 Children from Their Homes

To justify kicking nearly 30,000 Michigan children off of a pittance of state assistance on October 1st, Michigan Representative Agema quotes this Bible verse from 2 Theselonians 3:10 :

"let them that will not work, not eat"

I'm not sure how the other State representatives are justifying throwing tens of thousands of Michigan's children out on the street while handing that money over to their favorite businesses as tax cuts in exchange for...apparently...letting the state job situation contract some more.

But I'm sure our Republican legislators clutch their ultraconservative one liners closely to their chests to warm themselves as they snuggle warm into bed safe in their tax payer supplied pensions, salaries, and health care.

The state Legislature on Wednesday passed a 48-month lifetime limit on welfare benefits expected to cast more than 11,000 families off the welfare rolls on Oct. 1 — including more than 29,700 children, according to state officials.
The cumulative time limit will save $77.4 million in the budget year that starts Oct. 1, but Democrats and child advocates said they fear it will cause a humanitarian crisis as social agencies are flooded with families who can't pay for rent, utilities or other essentials.


From The Detroit News

As of October 1st, thousands of Michigan families will be without a means of paying for shelter, clothing, utilities. Here's an image from the Detroit News showing which Michigan regions are hardest hit by this new law.



Yes...maybe they should just go out and get jobs!

Wizardkitten's blog points out that as Michigan's unemployment numbers are once again on the rise, Up to a thousand people applying to 12 positions at a new Aldi store in Holland, Michigan.

12 to 1000! I like those odds. Why, that's a good sporting 1% chance at finding a job each time you apply! And who knows, you MIGHT be that lucky one who wins the grand prize of working part time at minimum wage!

The problem isn't that people don't want to work. The problems is that there is no work, and no money changing hands.

Casting tens of thousands of Michgian's children from state assistance isn't going to change that.

Michigan Republicans Poised to Slash Up to 57% of City Revenues

First off...I have no love for the personal property tax on businesses. In some cases, it can be a hardship on very small mom and pop businesses, while it's merely a niussance to larger businesses.

That said, the state of Michigan's new diabolical scheme to eliminate the tax is the worst kind of dogmatic irresponsibility...as in, it's the kind that's going to bring ruin on many of our more industrial centers in Michigan. As in, finished. Done. Deadsville. Bankrupt. As if our cities need another boot to the head. Many of the more industrial cities get at least half of their revenue from personal property tax. Here's an image from the Michgian Municipal League website of what some cities stand to lose in city revenue if this tax cut goes through:



River Rouge could lose 57% of its revenue. Evart, Michigan could lose 35%. And so on. This would KILL a lot of cities.

Okay, but what's the personal property tax?

It's a tax on equipment a businesses owns.

For some things, it makes sense to tax these things since there's a society cost. For example, some equipment makes loud, horrible noises. Other equipment makes tons of dust. Some creates pollutants that need to be cleaned.

For other things, it's kind of irritating...for example when it applies to furniture. For example, my wife has display cases in her store, and she pays a tax on each one that's IN her store. There's no societal cost, it's just a tax on a business owning furniture.

Okay. Whatever. That's what personal property tax is.

Now...if you think about this tax, you can start to see how a town with factories would probably have a lot more revenue from personal property tax than, say, a suburb or a town that is mostly homes and few businesses.

In some well-off residential communities such as the Grosse Pointes, personal property tax accounts for 2 percent or less of property tax revenues. In River Rouge, a Downriver industrial city of 8,000 residents in Wayne County, personal property makes up more than half of property tax revenues, according to data compiled by the Michigan Municipal League.

"I basically would have no other choice but to declare bankruptcy," if the tax was repealed and not replaced, said River Rouge Mayor Michael Bowdler.
"You're punishing communities that have been corporation friendly, versus the bedroom communities that don't have to put up with the noise and the dust and everything else."


From The Detroit News

This is the sort of tax cut that's going to hit industrial centers MUCH harder than rich suburbs. That, of course, fits the pattern of our Republican leadership. Spare those with the money, kneecap those without.

And while I have no particular love for the personal property tax, my love for my state is greater than my irritation that a small time mom and pop store has to pay a tax on owning a chair or a computer.

The Michigan Municipal League is fighting back against this new proposed tax cut with its Replace Don't Erase campaign. If our legislators are hell bent on removing this tax...they NEED TO have the political gonads to stand up to their slash, burn, and salt the earth tax cut zealots funding their campaigns and come up with REPLACEMENT REVENUE for Michigan cities. We can't cut anymore.

Bringing the Job Creation Conversation to All Corners of America

Michigan Senator Debbie Stabenow and President Barack Obama get it.

They GET it. To get jobs moving again, we need to invest in jobs at the bottom level and diversify, diversify, diversify. And something else interesting is happening here...we seem to have some evidence of our representatives bringing actual tangible discussions on the nuts and bolts of HOW to create jobs and stimulate the economy to every corner of our nation and states...

The conversation: Sure, let's make jobs. But HOW?

My bet: they aren't screaming for more tax cuts and a balanced DC budget. The more folks we can bring into this conversation the better...because the more people who see that tax cuts alone won't get this economy moving again, the more we'll start to have a serious national debate on jobs programs.

Michigan Senator Debbie Stabenow is in Sparta Michigan today with Obama's Agriculture Secretary (And my former Iowa Governor) Tom Vilsack to hold a round table discussion on how State, Federal, and local efforts can work together to create jobs and create more economic opportunities for rural regions.

Lots of folks tend to think of Michigan as an industrial state...but our second largest industry is agriculture which contributes about 71 billion dollars annually to Michigan's economy. And with over 200 crops, Michigan ranks among the most diverse agricultural economies in America.

Last year, Michigan farm exports grew 10 percent over 2009 figures, delivering $1.75 billion in sales and supporting almost 15,000 jobs in the state.

[snip]

To encourage Michigan's local and regional food movement, USDA is supporting smaller and mid-sized farmers in Michigan, who may not have the ability to compete in international markets. USDA is providing specialty crop growers – who account for nearly $2 billion in annual agricultural sales for Michigan – with research and assistance aimed at combating pests and diseases that may threaten the productivity of farmers. Last year, USDA provided the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development with funding for 25 projects that support specialty crops efforts like conducting radio advertising to increase sales of fresh Michigan asparagus and promoting locally grown Michigan apples in the greater Chicago market to raise awareness and grow market share. In July, USDA announced that it will conduct a pilot program for acquiring fresh fruits and vegetables to increase farm-to-school programs in Michigan. The pilot will use commercial distribution models already in place and allow schools to obtain locally grown produce.

Today is the day you create a job.

If you happen to be part of the American Dream and you have a house, it's bound to happen.

Somebody is going to knock on your front door, and you'll answer it and see it's somebody you either do not know or it's somebody you sort of tangentially know. Maybe it's some kid. Maybe it's a couple kids. Maybe it's a scruffy middle aged man or woman and maybe they have kids with them.

And they say to you "Hey, I'm going around seeing if I can mow peoples' lawns or sweep your driveway."

And your first impulse may be to say, "Oh, no thanks!" Maybe the thought of parting with $10 or $20 for somebody to mow your lawn sends you into mild panic...or maybe you simply don't have $10 or $20. Or maybe you are just so overwhelmed with other stuff right now, that this isn't a decision you want to make at this very moment and you resent the interruption, resent being pressed to make a decision about something you hadn't wanted to make a decision about.

This happened to me today, and my impulse was to withdraw and go into my hording mode. Things have been tight for a long time, and my impulse was to just say "Sorry, we're broke."

But before you do or say anything, I encourage folks to wait a moment and ponder the dynamic presented to you.

Somebody is at your door, looking for work.

They're not looking for a hand out. They're looking for WORK, and they're going from house to house to find it. It's discouraging, hard work.

Maybe today is the day you say "You know what? I DO need my lawn mowed." And maybe if you don't have enough dough, you can find out how much money you DO have and you can ask them what that much money will buy ya. I bet it will buy a lot.

Because I hear so much talk on Conservative TV shows and radio shows of down and out people being lazy, expecting America to carry their water for them, and not willing to work. And the thing is, I have NO IDEA who where all these lazy bastard mainstream Americans are. Cuz the down and out folks i know are some of the most enthusiastic workers that I know.

Conservative commentators look out into America and see a sea of lazy. I look out into America and see a vast expanse of hard working and innovative people doing everything they can to stay afloat.

Rick Snyder's September 1st Job Culling, Consumer Screwing Bonanza

B is worried.

Her boyfriend works at Meijer and may see his hours cut dramatically because of the repeal of a Michigan law that will take effect September 1st of this year. Meijer is a major supermarket in Michigan...and B's boyfriend is a stock clerk there. He spends much of his time at his job pricing items before putting them on the shelves.

But soon the whole Pricing Items thing is about to be eliminated, courtesy of the Rick Snyder Administration...it's going to save stores over 2 billion dollars per year.....largely in personnel costs. Good bye jobs! With State level deregulation like this, it's no wonder Michigan's economic recovery stalled out at the 10.5% rate and Michigan lost 30,000 jobs in the past three months.

We're about to lose more. And of course it hits the lowest wage earners the hardest at the worst possible time.

The Michigan Pricing and Advertising of Consumer Items Act of 1976, AKA the Scanner Law, required that items in stores be individually priced.

The idea was to protect consumers as price scanning became more common...so that consumers would be able to compare the price they were charged on the receipt to the price of the tag.

Rick Snyder's administration sees the law as merely a drag on the state economy. Apparently businesses have become much more honest since 1979, and consumers no longer need a means to compare the price they paid with the price that the item is marked.

So the consumer will suffer. Low wage earners will suffer, because there will be less of a need to hire people to price items. But hey! At least the megamarts will benefit! And that's what it's all about, right?

The Tea Party Recession

I wish I could have been at Obama's speech today in Holland, Michigan. It's just 20 miles to the Sounth of me, but darnit, I had a raptor center I had to bring my kids to, and besides I didn't have a ticket. But It seems Obama's got the snare drum out and he's steadily laying down a beat about the Tea Party Recession. The Tea Party Recession...

...This isn't a man on the defense making talking points to shoot down criticisms of his leadership or economic stewardship.

This is a man going on the offense. He's chiseling his own talking points into the rock slab halls of the media juggernaut. No, no...he does not tell the marble what it will reveal. The marble tells him what it is...what must be revealed.

In this case, it's The Tea Party Recession. The current economic troubles aren't from some years long coke fueled banker manic gambling phase, like our last major crisis. And they're not from uncertainty in the middle east, or from wars, or from jobless figures.

No...the current economic troubles are entirely fabricated from whole cloth, tailored to drag America down until it can be dried and crumbled and smoked in a crack pipe to induce the euphoric illusion of some delusional, fanciful notion of an America that never existed, nor ever should exist.

And the Tea Party is so wonderfully and unabashedly proud of its willingness to drive America into oblivion so they can get their fix, that they are just too easy a target for this new type of framing....the Tea Party Recession. Because, after all, it was the very same Tea Party principles that lead us into the recession in the first place: lower taxes for millionaires and billionaires, deregulation, and a twisted obsession with focusing the entire national dialog on how they intend to change the US Constitution with amendments they want to add and amendments they want to scrap.

In an energetic speech to workers at a Holland, Michigan, hybrid car battery plant helped by government stimulus funds, Obama said the U.S. economy and American workers are capable of being the best in the world, but were being held back by political stalemate in Congress.
"There is nothing wrong with our country. There is something wrong with our politics," Obama declared to applause.
Last week's first-ever downgrade of the U.S. credit rating by Standard & Poor's "could have been entirely avoided if there had been a willingness to compromise in Congress," the president said, adding: "It didn't happen because we didn't have the capacity to pay our bills. It happened because Washington doesn't have the capacity to come together and get things done."

Child Poverty Costs the US 4% of GDP

Here's an interesting tidbit I dug out of Google Scholar today:

Holzer et al. (2007) calculate that child poverty costs theUnited States $500 billion per year, or nearly 4 percent of GDP.

I found the reference in this article called How Poor are the Poor? where a professor attacks a Heritage Foundation report that, really, people below the poverty line in America are living lives of luxury -- something about how the Heritage Foundation used American Housing Survey definitions of poverty, rather than the official poverty line. As it turn out the AHS's definition of poverty is twice as high as the US poverty line.

I admit, though, that I found the reference to child poverty costing the US 4% of GDP a lot more compelling. I mean, we all know the Heritage Foundation is full of crap.

The notion is that in addition to a moral reason to reduce poverty and near-poverty rates in the US. There is also an ECONOMIC reason to do so. And everybody loves that. Or at least they say they do.

As for our actual methodology, we measure the effects of poverty on these outcomes using estimates of the statistical association between childhood poverty (or low family income) and such outcomes as adult earnings, participation in crime, or poor health.1 These impacts do not hold for every single individual growing up in poverty, as some children who grow up poor do not become poor as adults and some who are nonpoor as children become poor as adults.2 But the estimates we use represent the average likelihood of lower earnings, participation in crime or poor health among adults who grew up in poverty.


In the jargon of economists, lost earnings are an opportunity cost—a cost that is incurred because the opportunity to be productive and generate earnings is lost. And since all earnings ultimately derive from economic output, it is reasonable to consider any foregone earnings associated with poverty as reflecting lost output for the U.S. economy.3 This estimate will also reflect the average impact of poverty on the level of GDP in any year, which abstracts from any effects poverty might have on the rate of growth in GDP over time.

I encourage you to read the whole study. It more or less boils down to this: Kids who don't get enough education, food, and health care in earlier life tend not to reach their developmental potential. And an increase of a likelihood of turning to crime removes that person's potential from the economy.

He goes through in mad detail how he arrived at the 4% number.

4%...that's like half a trillion dollar increase in GDP right there, and imagine all the savings to medicaid and welfare over time.

In conclusion...we should probably get people back to work and solve this problem of poor in the US. If not for them...do it for Wall Street, man. Do it for Wall Street.

Physically Watching Our Worlds Crumble

Well, it's finally happened. Ol' besse is giving up the ghost. After emitting noxious fumes into the cabin for a week and sputtering like an animal after a massive stroke, the Ford Escort up and died. Sorta. I was able to nurse it on back home, but slowly and with the hazards on.

To make matters even more pathetic, it died while we were driving between thrift stores in search of a used washing machine because our washing machine also died. Last time it was the coupler, which we fixed. This time it seems to be the washing machine transmission which costs just about as much as a used washing machine just for the part.

On the bright side, we still have the toaster. The toaster is working fine. I just toasted a bagel, so I can vouch for the full functionality of the toaster.

I guess I'm more stressed about the car than the washing machine. The problem with being a single car family is, you don't have a back-up car. And the problem with cars is, they're very expensive. Even the cheap ones.

As I wallow in self pity for a moment, this gives me a good opportunity to segue into the notion of middle class momentum.

When somebody first enters into a lousy economic situation after having had a job for a while, they probably had a car and functional appliances and most were probably in halfway decent working order. Their glasses were probably of the correct prescription and clothes were probably new-ish and their socks and underwear probably had a decent hole to no-hole ratio, favoring No Holes. The living quarters were probably maintained well enough.

And for a while, sans job, folks are able to live, more or less, a standard middle class existence with most of the amenities: Microwave, Car, Television, Lawn Mower, Washer and Drier, maybe even a dish washer and some sort of Air Conditioning.

But as time wears on, and the economic situation doesn't change......these things start to decay. The eyes get worse and the prescription isn't quite exactly right. The washing machine dies. The car troubles are put off for another day...and put off, and put off, and put off. The machines in our lives that we generally associate with a middle class existence fall apart one after another...

...we watch, physically WATCH, the world crumble around us.

Snyders Policies Already Costing Michigan Jobs

And the economic carnage from Michigan Governor Rick Snyder begins...A solar plant is relocating from Brighton, Michigan to Portage, Indiana. They're taking with them over 500 jobs. Great news for Indiana, bad news for Michigan...and a direct result of Snyder's new tax policies.

First this

"Let's stop the tax credits"

-- Rick Snyder

Then this...

[Indiana] plans to provide up to $4.2 million in tax credits based on the [solar] company's job creation plan. The Austria-based company plans to invest more than $26 million in the Portage plant, which officials said would help the company meet global demand for solar electronic inverters.

And so, this...

A solar technology company is moving its North American headquarters from Brighton to northwest Indiana.

The Indiana Economic Development Corp. said Thursday that Fronius USA will relocate to Portage, Ind., where it plans to lease 400,000 square feet of manufacturing space and create up to 512 jobs by 2016.

Bravo, Michigan conservatives.

Bravo.

So rarely can one make such a direct line from fiscal policy to job losses. But this is a pretty clear case.

Well done, Conservatives.

It seems our reps have convinced themselves that taxes and tax credits actually played a role in Michigan's economic woes over the past several decades...you know...instead of being singularly attached to a crumbling domestic automobile industry.

Granholm and the Dems...and...well...pretty much EVERYBODY in Michigan seems to understand we desperately need to diversify our economy. Our conservative leaders seem to actually think our problem was simultaneously Too High taxation and Too Low taxation (in the case of tax credits).

Here we go again.

Rick Snyder De-Invents Michigan

Michigan Governor Rick Snyder's budget recently passed with 19 State Senators voting no and 19 State Senators voting yes...the tie was broken by Lt. Governor Calley.

Much has already been made of how this budget cuts large business taxes at the expense of low wage earners and retirees.

Little has been made, however, of another failure of this budget...there's no plan for economic diversification. In fact, the tax credits that had been put in place by Grahnolm's administration to stimulate new industries in Michigan have been removed.

Michigan hadn't been served well by being a single industry state. For the living memory of most people in this state, Michigan has always been a boom and bust economy. The booms became less and less prosperous compared to the rest of the nation. And the busts have became increasingly severe. The last one lasted more than a decade. While the rest of the nation saw more moderated ups and downs from 2001 to 2008, Michigan's single industry economy continued to stall along with the domestic auto makers.

When times are good or improving, our leaders seem to be content to let the state continue as a single industry economy. Engler blew Michigan's chance to diversify during good times in the 1990s...and it appears his protege Rick Snyder is setting us to for the same thing now that the auto companies are profitable again...for now.

And we all know where that leads. We KNOW where that leads. There's no ambiguity. There's no mystery. We KNOW where that leads us. We know, because we've been there most of our lives.

I spoke to Republican State Senator Geoff Hansen about this very subject...about how the budget has no plan for diversifying the economy, that it strips out most incentives for new industries, and he blurted out the general talking point about picking winners and losers. As though it's some moral rule that supersedes good governance. As though several lifetimes of boom and bust cycles weren't evidence enough that we KNOW what Michigan's economy will do, left to its own devices.

We KNOW that left to its own organic growth, Michigan will continue down the road toward a single industry economy as it has for the past 100 years. We KNOW that.

We KNOW that without incentives to grow new industries, we'll stay the same vulnerable and shaky economy we've been for decades.

We KNOW that.

Governor Granholm spent her 8 years in office, during some of Michigan's worst years for a long time, trying to lure NEW industries here: biomedical engineering, film, solar, advanced battery manufacturing, tourism. Those were the only glimmers of hope out there for the past decade while the auto industries crumbled around us.

But Snyder has mostly put an end to that.

Now that the domestic auto industry is profitable again, Michigan leaders can bury their heads in the sand again. They can go back to business as usual.

This tax plan isn't a reinvention of Michigan. It's the pursuit of the same lazy policy that's caused decades of boom-bust cycles...but mostly bust cycles.

A Don't Buy Chinese [Solar Panels] Clause in the Military Authorization Law

Ah yes, another win for green manufacturing and yet another victory from the productive 111th congress lame duck session...

The military authorization law signed by President Obama on Friday contains a little-noticed “Buy American” provision for the Defense Department purchases of solar panels — a provision that is likely to dismay Chinese officials as President Hu Jintao prepares to visit the United States next week.

The new Military authorization law contains a Buy American (generally speaking) clause, requiring that any solar panels purchased by the military, and the military is quite the purchaser of solar panels, be purchased from US companies.

Rad.

Now to be more detailed, it's not purely a Buy American clause, though it's effectively that. There's a work-around that more or less amount to that, though, in that it restricts purchasing from China while staying compliance with WTO rules:

Two prominent trade lawyers said in e-mails over the weekend that the law’s language meant that in practice, the Defense Department must buy solar panels from any country that signs the W.T.O.’s side agreement on government procurement. Earlier American trade laws require compliance with that agreement.

Virtually all industrialized countries have signed the side agreement, which requires free trade in government purchases. China vowed to sign it as soon as possible when it joined the W.T.O. in November 2001, but still has not done so.

[snip]

Inland Chinese provinces and cities have strongly lobbied Beijing not to sign the agreement because they want to retain the legal right to continue steering government contracts to local companies, said a trade policy adviser to the Chinese government who insisted on anonymity because of the political sensitivity of the issue.

It's nice to see the Obama administration taking a more determined stance against China's one-sided trade practices in the realm of renewable energy. For one reason, these new technologies need to be nurtured in a fair and safe environment if the US intends to be competitive in them in the long run. And another reason, it's high time China be called out on its own protectionist crap with a stern school-marmish ruler across the knuckles.

The solar panel provision in the defense appropriations law comes as President Obama has ordered a broad investigation into whether Chinese export subsidies, local content requirements and other rules have violated W.T.O. rules. As a result of the investigation, the United States started a W.T.O. case on Dec. 22 against what it said were Chinese wind turbine manufacturing subsidies.

American trade officials said then that they were still examining other Chinese clean-energy subsidy policies to decide whether to file additional W.T.O. cases.

Michigan one of the fastest growing producers of solar cells i America, an industry growing even faster in the state than the production of wind turbine parts...which also seems like it's going to have some protections soon.

This new Buy American law is going to directly benefit the manufacturing states.

Along the same topic...Hey look! Ford is installing a massive 500 kw solar array into one of its Michigan automobile plants. It's estimated that it will save the company 116 grand.

When the plant is inactive, such as holidays, the collected solar energy will go into the energy storage system for later use, providing power during periods of insufficient or inconsistent sunlight, says Ford. In addition, the energy storage system will be able to recharge from the grid during off-peak hours when energy is available at a lower cost.

The combined systems are expected to save an estimated $160,000 per year in energy costs. Installation of the system begins later this year.

Cool.

Multigenerational households on the rise

The wife and I were recently discussing the number of people in their mid 20s to 30s that we know who have recently moved back in with their parents. All of them did so out of necessity...they had lost jobs in other parts of the nation and moved back to their place of birth.

As it turns out, it wasn't our imaginations.

Multi-generational households are on a dramatic rise in the United States. That is, households with more than one adult generation living under one roof.

Today, 49 million Americans - one in six - live in a home with at least two adult generations, or a grandparent and one other generation. That's 21 million more than in 1980.

A 133% rise in multigenerational households in the past 30 years is a significant number, considering a previous trend downward for most of a century prior...and compared to the less than 50% increase in the general US population.

A rise in multigenerational households is not a sign of increasing prosperity. Living with ones parents at an increasing rate isn't something an increasingly prosperous people do. It's a sign of a contraction. People consolidating.

Americans are consolidating. And have been more and more for the past 30 years.

This is a symptom of a trend that can be reversed, stretching from the dawn of trickle down economics.