Employment in Michigan and Minnesota
The biggest push-back we get on our using Minnesota as a model for Michigan is racial. Some version of “they don’t have the concentration of minorities–particularly low income African Americans–we have.” Which is true. Racial minorities are 13 percent of Minnesota’s working age population (16 and older), 21 percent of Michigan’s. (For African Americans its […]
Low unemployment, but …
The economic good news is the declining unemployment rate, particularly in Michigan. But when you look behind the headline number the jobs picture is a lot less positive. The unemployment rate decline has as much to do with a decline in the denominator (those in the labor force) as it does with a rise in […]
Sixty percent with credentials
Sixty percent is becoming the standard estimate of the proportion of working age adults who need a post secondary credential to meet the skill needs of the state and national economy. These credentials include four years degrees and more, two year degrees and occupational certificates from post secondary institutions. Currently Michigan post secondary credential rate […]
Integration and increasing mobility
Income mobility in American is declining. Increasingly what your parents earn predicts what you will earn. Certainly not consistent with the core American value of equal opportunity. As President Obama said in his second Inaugural Address: “We are true to our creed when a little girl born into the bleakest poverty knows that she has the […]
Soft bigotry of low expectations
Our Michigan Future Schools initiative is designed to create, at scale, open enrollment high schools in Detroit that graduate students college ready who ultimately earn college degrees. We provided funding to help start eleven new high schools. Continue to work with eight of them plus one more. Eight charter schools and one DPS. Nearly everyone […]
Minnesota #1
CNBC ranked Minnesota the best state to do business in. Pretty surprising. Good economy? Yes. Good place to do business? Conventional wisdom is no. We have long used Minnesota as our model state. Because it has the best economic outcomes in the Great Lakes and one of the best in the country. Both high per […]
Paul Ryan and the earned income tax credit
Michigan policymakers seem hell bent to eliminate the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). They already have reduced the credit from 20 to six percent to help pay for Governor Snyder’s big business tax cut. A huge tax increase on the working poor. Now the State House and Senate has voted to eliminate it entirely to […]