No Time to Backtrack on High School Standards
Amber Arellano’s Detroit News editorial on high school standards is highly recommended. (Get it here.) As she argues reducing the standards, particularly in math, – as many educators are pushing for – would be a big mistake. The new graduation standards are one of the few accomplishments of Lansing policy makers in the last decade […]
Books to Read II
More book recommendations. As you know we have concluded that retaining and attracting talent – particularly young college graduates – is one of the keys to growing the Michigan economy. Two books cover the topic best: Who’s Your City by Richard Florida. We believe that human capitol is now the driver of the economy. Florida […]
Higher Education Is A Priority
Lansing State Journal – Michigan Must Ready Itself for Jobs Recently the Lansing State Journal ran a terrific editorial about the future of the mid Michigan economy. You can find it as an attachment below. Its message is applicable to the entire state. Its quite simple: job growth and particularly good-paying jobs from today forward […]
The Higher Ed Challenge
We believe Michigan’s higher education system is one of our best assets for rebuilding a prosperous Michigan. Its kind of hard to imagine how we could build in the last century one of the best public higher ed systems on the planet, and then when it matters most disinvest in it. Not smart! But higher […]
Michigan’s Transition to a Knowledge-Based Economy – Annual Progress Report
Michigan Future has completed the second annual report on Michigan’s transition to a knowledge-based economy and what we found is stunning – the trends we have written about in our previous reports have accelerated in the downturn.
Books to Read
I’m often asked to recommend books to read. When it comes to understanding the economy the two books that have helped me the most to understand the nature of the fundamental change we are going through are: The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman. It still is the best book I know of to understand […]
Minnesota and Alabama, Part II
I previously wrote about Minnesota and Alabama having virtually the same unemployment rate at the time we published our last report. That had been true from 2006-08. But with the same unemployment rate, Minnesota had per capita income more than $8,000 higher. From our perspective it is clear that Michigan needs to move in the […]
Detroit Drives Michigan
The press coverage of the likely change from Detroit Renaissance to Michigan Renaissance included quotes from the organization’s leadership that they believed that if you fix Michigan, you fix Detroit. We respectfully disagree! Is it Illinois that is driving the Chicago economy or Chicago that is driving the Illinois economy? What about Minneapolis and Minnesota, […]
WILS Interview on Michigan Future, Inc.
Did a radio interview with Walt Sorg of WILS radio recently. Its probably the best summary I’ve done of what Michigan Future is all about. You can listen by clicking on the link here. The interview previews a presentation I did for a metro Lansing community forum. But its message applies to the entire state. […]
Where Do We Want to Go From Here?
Michigan Future started its work with the question “where do we want to go from here?” Because if you don’t know where you are going, all roads lead there. To figure out what to work on, you need to know where you are trying to get. Our answer: a high prosperity Michigan. A place with […]