Reserve Your Sympathy

The state of Michigan is in an economic freefall. The deterioration of its financial system is a shining example of government overregulation, over taxation and the enforcement of right-to-work laws.

The state’s unemployment is the highest in the nation at 7.4%, and its residents are bailing out at the fastest pace in the nation. For every two residents that escape Michigan, only one enters. Including births and the onslaught of impoverished illegal aliens, its population grew a paltry .1%.

This explains why housing prices are plummeting. There is a good chance Michigan will lead the nation in 2008 for having the fastest decline in property values—and the most bank foreclosures per capita.

Like all the top ten states with the highest taxes and uncontrolled spending, Michigan’s residents are experiencing income growth about one-third less, and about one-half the job growth as the ten states with the fastest growing economies.

Michigan is a perfect example of big government’s willingness to defy gravity. To compensate for the declining revenues from state income and property taxes, the crack Democratic troops that manage the state, legislated a $1.4 billion tax increase on businesses.

Of course, this liberal version of an economic solution is a Ponzi Scheme. The scheme works until it runs out of new investors to feed the growth of government.

This is what is happening in Michigan. Business and the productive members of society are abandoning the state. The state is collapsing under the weight of taxation. It’s running out of people and things to tax.

No one would complain if the state government just collapsed on itself. But it doesn’t work that way. Everyone sinks with it; everyone is harmed except the entrenched bureaucrats. The state’s bloated bureaucracy—the non-productive segment of society—won’t suffer any deprivation.

Michigan is a microcosm of the Democratic blueprint for the future of all America. All of its presidential candidates are demanding higher taxes on business, the wealthy and greater regulation of the economic engine driving growth.

The left’s need for greater tax revenues is unquenchable. It’s what keeps the entitlement engine afloat. And entitlements keep the Democrats afloat.

Must people have suffered hard times. It’s natural to be sympathetic to the plight of Michigan’s citizens. But sympathy is elastic. It constricted when the victims of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans re-elected that scoundrel, Mayor Ray Nagin.

If Michigan goes Democratic in the fall election, they get what they deserve. So reserve your sympathy.

Please note: The statistics were assembled by Michael D. LaFaive, Director of the Morey Fiscal Policy Initiative at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy.