Category Archives: Public Policy and Governance

On Wisconsin

In the movies, the righteous “little guy” usually prevails over the moneyed forces seeking to enrich themselves further at the expense of the public. In real life, not so much.

Today is the Wisconsin recall election. As the media has endlessly intoned, this is only the third time in American history that a sitting Governor has been subject to a recall. (The last time was in California, where we expect such shenanigans.)

Whatever else is at stake in Wisconsin, today’s election is first and foremost about the power of money. Scott Walker, the Governor, is so obviously a pawn of the plutocrats who own him body and–if he has one–soul that he barely matters. For those who’ve been hiding out on another planet (actually, a wise decision) the facts are simple: Walker narrowly won the Governor’s race, and immediately began bargaining with Wisconsin’s public-sector unions for “givebacks,” citing the state’s fiscal woes. The unions largely acceded, agreeing to wage and benefit cuts. After getting what they wanted, Walker and the GOP legislature nevertheless proceeded to strip the unions of their bargaining rights.

In the ensuing furor, it became pretty clear that this had been Walker’s game plan all along, despite the fact that his anti-bargaining position never surfaced during his campaign for office.

Walker’s hard-right ideology–fueled by huge donations by the infamous Koch brothers and other wealthy backers–hasn’t been limited to union-busting. He also signed a bill repealing Wisconsin’s equal pay law, rolling back the principle that men and women doing the same job should be paid the same wage.

In the wake of Walker’s betrayal of the unions that had bargained with him in good faith, there were weeks of demonstrations. Working women were furious at his assault on the principle of equal pay. His closest advisors are under investigation for criminal activities. A former college girlfriend has gone public with a story about how the “pro life” Walker deserted her when she got pregnant and refused to have an abortion. Wisconsin’s job numbers are dismal–dead last, according to one report.

With all this, you’d think this recall would be a slam-dunk. You’d be wrong.

I am not a fan of recalls as a policy matter, but Wisconsin law allows them, and this Governor has been a disaster for Wisconsin. Nevertheless, polls show him slightly ahead going into today’s election, and that shouldn’t surprise anyone who has followed the money trail. The wealthy backers who have actually been deciding Wisconsin’s policies have poured millions of dollars into the campaign,  burying Tom Barrett, his opponent, in a blizzard of radio, television and internet ads. Campaign contributions are running 8-1 in Walker’s favor, and in our post Citizens United world, Wisconsin voters have little idea where that money is coming from.

The real question Wisconsin voters will answer today is: can money buy democracy?

This isn’t a movie, and I’m very much afraid the answer will be yes.

Comments

Sociological Whiplash

Yesterday’s New York Times Magazine was devoted to innovation. It had a story about Craig Ventner, who sequenced the human genome and is working on producing artificial life–including bacteria that will excrete a substitute for oil. It had a story about inventions poised to come on the market–a fabric that can charge your cellphone, a car with cruise control that automatically maintains a set distance between you and the car in front of you, a bike with anti-theft handlebars, synthetic alcohol (on Star Trek, that was called synthahol!), vastly improved resolution for movies,a blood test for depression… My favorite was a breakthrough that would substitute an edible “shell” for food packaging. For example, your yogurt might come in a shell of strawberry you could eat, rather than another carton to clutter our landfills.

The whole issue was a tribute to human ingenuity and smarts–to our ability to understand our world and its building blocks and to confront our challenges big and small.

And then there’s our politics. If America is producing savvy scientists and remarkable technologies–and we are–we are also electing embarrassing buffoons who are doing their best to return us to that state of nature known as “ignorant.”

There are so many examples, choosing one was hard, but let me try. This week, North Carolina lawmakers proposed a new law that would require estimates of sea level rise to be based only on historical data—not on all the evidence that demonstrates that the seas are rising much faster now thanks to global warming. The sea level along the coast of North Carolina is expected to rise about a meter by the end of the century. Business interests in the state are worried that the projected rise will make it harder for them to develop along the coast line. So legislators plan to deal with that issue by writing a law requiring inaccurate projections.

Scott Huler, who works for Scientific American and lives in North Carolina, summed up this brilliant approach thusly:

Which, yes, is exactly like saying, do not predict tomorrow’s weather based on radar images of a hurricane swirling offshore, moving west towards us with 60-mph winds and ten inches of rain. Predict the weather based on the last two weeks of fair weather with gentle breezes towards the east. Don’t use radar and barometers; use the Farmer’s Almanac and what grandpa remembers.

In this corner, the brilliant minds that gave you your computer and IPhone. In that corner, the champions of denial and short-term gratification. The existential questions: can the smart guys save us from the idiots we elect?  And figure out why we elect them?

Comments

Wanting Indiana’s Cake After Eating It

I have a great idea. I’m going to sell my house, but demand that the State continue to give me my homeowner’s tax credit.  Think “our man Mitch” would approve?

I don’t either.

But how is that any different from his complaint about the distribution of federal highway funds?

Highway funds are allocated to the states on the basis of a formula that includes the miles of road the state must maintain. As I understand it, the feds are taking the eminently reasonable position that since Indiana contracted away its responsibility to maintain the Toll Road, the Toll Road mileage should be subtracted from the mileage used in the formula. That will cost the state some $40 million this year, and our governor is incensed at the unfairness of it all.

I think we can guess what his position would be if he were still budget director; he’d not only support the new calculation, he’d probably be demanding a refund for the years since the Toll Road was leased. (Apparently, the feds aren’t trying to penalize Indiana for their delay in adjusting the formula. He should be grateful for small favors!)

Indiana got a big windfall when we “leased” (essentially, sold) a state asset, just as I would get a big cash payout for my equity if I sold my house. When the Toll Road lease was negotiated, the state made a big deal of the fact that the vendor would be responsible for maintaining that asset. If I sold my house, I would also be relieved of the need to fix the roof, keep the plumbing in repair, cut the grass…all those expenses attendant to homeownership.

The only difference is, I would be ashamed to whine about losing a tax credit to which I would no longer be entitled.

Demanding federal highway funds to maintain a road someone else is legally obligated to maintain takes real chutzpah.

Comments

A Succinct Prescription

One of the things I enjoy about Facebook is my friends’ regular posting of cartoons, pithy sayings and thought-provoking quotations (some real, some highly doubtful…).

This morning, someone posted a photo of a sign held by a member of the “Occupy” movement. The sign enumerated the “demands” of the 99% –healthcare for all, jobs, good public education and a clean environment.

That really doesn’t seem to be too much to expect.

When we ask THE political question–what should government do?–most liberal democracies have answered that government is the collective mechanism we use to provide those things individuals cannot provide alone. Economists call this “market failure,” but the basic idea is that, in order to flourish as individual citizens, we require an infrastructure. To use a local example, individuals buy their own cars, but they need roads on which to drive them, traffic signals to direct them safely, etc. The over-arching question in free societies is always: what should government provide, and what should be left to the private and nonprofit sectors? What can people do for themselves through the market or through voluntary associations, and what must be provided collectively–i.e., “socialized.” (Yes, Tea Party people, that’s what that word means.)

The list on the placard, while not exhaustive, seems pretty reasonable to me. Individuals acting alone cannot protect the environment. Health and education are not consumer goods, they are public goods–and leaving them to the vagaries of the market leads to huge inequities and inefficiencies. As for jobs, I’m one of those throwbacks who thinks we ought to seriously debate the merits of government as the employer of last resort.

Health, jobs, education and clean air and water. What will the ungrateful masses demand next?

Comments

The Real State of the State

A former student of mine is a researcher for Indiana’s Institute for Working Families. (I strongly encourage those of you who are interested in evidence about the status of working Hoosiers to visit and like the Institute’s Facebook page.) He was the lead researcher for the Institute’s recently released report, The Status of Working Families 2011. That report, which he shared with me, is a sobering corrective to the political hype that passes for news these days.

The punditocracy has characterized Indiana as an economic “success story,” as a state that weathered the Great Recession better than most. As the Institute’s report makes clear, that rosy evaluation ignores a number of highly inconvenient facts: the state has 231,500 fewer jobs than before the recession (Indiana is among only 17 states that have continued to experience absolute declines in the labor force since the recession began); our median wage for those with a bachelor’s degree is $0.80 lower than the national average (and a mere 14.6% of Hoosiers even have a bachelor’s degree–we rank 42d in the nation); since 2000, the state has seen a 52% increase in poverty.

These and similar statistics in the report are depressing enough, but I think the most significant analysis centers on wages. Although our political rhetoric regularly conflates job creation and wages, they are two very different indicators of economic health, and both sides of that equation are important. We need more jobs, but not just any jobs. We need jobs that pay a living wage.

So how does Indiana stack up?

  • Indiana workers earn 85% of what workers in the rest of the country earn. We rank 41st in the nation.
  • Since 2000, wages have decreased for workers in both the 50th and 10th percentiles (by 3.4% and 10.6% respectively). This cannot be explained by decreased productivity, because productivity increased by over 14% during that same period.
  • Median household income fell by 13.6%–the second largest decrease in the nation. (Michigan was first.)
  • Median family income also decreased dramatically, falling 29.6%
  • Since 2000, Indiana has experienced a 52% increase in poverty.

The current administration believes that low tax rates and decimated unions will attract jobs to our state. Evidence does not support this belief. Businesses relocate to areas offering–among other things–an educated workforce and consumers with the discretionary income to buy their goods. They relocate to environments offering a high quality of life–parks, public transportation, good schools and a reasonable social safety net. These are the very things that suffer when lawmakers care only about slashing taxes and depressing wages.

There’s a reason businesses aren’t moving in droves to Mississippi.

If we continue to starve public education and local government, if we continue to pursue policies that depress wages and make it more difficult for families to escape poverty–if we continue to emulate states like Mississippi–businesses won’t move here, either.

Comments