Jobs and the Economy

Everyone’s campaign this year is about jobs, and so is mine. I am running because I believe Michigan has to create the conditions that lead to new jobs, and that means addressing and fixing big problems. My opponent has done neither.

Case in point: There was a loss of 205,000 jobs in Michigan from December 2000 to December 2002, according the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Through 2005, an additional 62,000 jobs were lost. Our largest job losses have occurred under the watch Republican-controlled state government. Their response; tax cuts, which didn’t help then, and they won’t help now.

Michigan is in serious economic trouble. Our current Representative from the 66th District is the Majority Floor Leader in the House of Representatives. He sets the agenda for the House and is in a very good position to address and fix the big problems that face our state. He has done nothing toward that end, and most of his legislation and actions have been aimed at keeping himself in power and souring relations among his collogues across the aisle.
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My opponent states that he is working to bring jobs to Michigan by “eliminating the job-killing Single Business Tax and other big government regulations that keep Michigan from gaining the jobs we need.” He assumed office a month after one of the largest unemployment rates was recorded in Michigan’s history. If the job killer is due to the SBT and government regulation, he is unbelievably slow and unresponsive in applying his own remedy. If my opponent truly believes that we are over-taxing our businesses, why then in his four years in office, is there not a single law or proposed law that would mandate what share of the budget business taxes should fund? If the state is losing jobs because of the SBT, why are the legislature and the majority leader not busy cutting state payments to local hospitals, municipal governments and public universities in order to pay for tax cuts to businesses?

I have a different take on the job loss that is affecting Michigan manufacturing. In 2000, as a sales manager for a key supplier of hydraulic and pneumatic components to the automotive industry and its supply chain, we experienced a 60 percent loss in sales. The machine tool market began leaving metropolitan Detroit for Germany, Italy and Japan. It was more competitive for them to manufacture transfer lines - which are the machine tools that make automobiles - in Europe and the Pacific Rim. In 2005 for the first time in 100 years, the majority of cars manufactured in North America were made in Ontario, Canada.

We as a sales force were required to assess the causes for this dramatic decline. I polled my customers, and I discovered that it was a single issue that had nothing to do with the reasons now being put forth by my opponent. It was not taxes, high wages, or government regulations that drove our jobs out of Michigan. It was health care.

The skyrocketing cost of health care is at the root of our job problems. It fuels the export of manufacturing jobs, erodes the competitiveness of our automotive companies and their suppliers, and wrecks havoc on our ability to fund public education.
Other state legislatures, notably in Massachusetts, agreed this year on a bill that would provide nearly universal health care to its citizens. It provides a mechanism for state citizens to obtain health care by apportioning the cost among business, individuals and government. Lawmakers in Massachusetts found a way to address a critical issue, one also faced by Michigan, in a non-partisan manner. It simultaneously places responsibility on individuals, helps those in dire need and improves the curb appeal for companies doing business in Massachusetts.

The actions in Massachusetts demonstrate the immense power to “get it done” when all sides come together to create solutions to address and fix big problems.

Despite the popular perception to the contrary, the people of Michigan are not over-taxed. Michigan ranks 29th - or 30th depending on the poll - in taxation among the 50 states. A report by Michigan Future Inc., a public policy think tank in Ann Arbor, states that per capita state and local taxes in Michigan were $90 below the national average in 2002. More cuts in the income tax have only increased the gap. Minnesota is $532 above the national average, Illinois is $160. Alabama is $973 below the average.

Education ranks with health care in creating conditions that will make it easier for our state to attract medium and small companies alike. Excellence in education is a quality of life issue that will help, rather then hamper, the attraction of new companies to our state. If low taxes were the huge draw for companies, as my opponent would have us believe, sweet home Alabama would be the headquarters of a lot more companies then they have today.

The clear difference between our current State Representative and myself is our approach to addressing and fixing big problems. The majority leader would eliminate $1.9 billion from the states budget without any corresponding cuts in services or alternate funding. He does not offer a substitute or restructuring of the business tax. The tired old mantra of incessant tax cuts has left Michigan poorer, not richer.

I propose a strategy of self-funding investments in our health care and our educational system. The most important thing we can do is to have a diverse, expanding economy of non-exportable high skilled, high wage jobs.

The choice is clear. McGonegal for the 66th.