High demand occupation cautionary tale
This post was originally published in November 2017. It is arguably more relevant today than then. In an article entitled Goodbye, $165,000 Tech Jobs. Student Coders Seek Work at Chipotle. the New York Times reports: Among college graduates ages 22 to 27, computer science and computer engineering majors are facing some of the highest unemployment […]
A 4th grade reading cautionary tale
Over the past several decades we have been inundated with stories about so-called education miracle states. All garnering attention because of big gains in National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) 4th grade reading scores. The current miracle state is Mississippi. Several years ago it was Tennessee. And back at the turn of the century it […]
Fixing the roads doesn’t drive state prosperity
Since the turn of the century, our state has experienced a precipitous decline in economic prosperity relative to the rest of the country. In 1999, Michigan ranked 16th in per-capita income. In 2024, we ranked 39th. What we have been doing over the past 25 years isn’t working. We need a new approach. Yet every […]
Michigan blue collar manufacturing jobs are not high paid
Blue collar manufacturing jobs––officially called production jobs––are no longer high paid. In 2024 Michigan had 445,000 production jobs out of 4.39 million payroll jobs. A little more than 10 percent of all Michigan payroll jobs. The median wage for a full time, year round Michigan production job was $45,470 compared to $48,300 for all Michigan workers. The average […]
The Working Parents Tax Credit is good for parents
The Working Parents Tax Credit (WPTC) is designed to substantially benefit both parents and employers. It is life-changing for parents and benefits employers by providing a strong incentive to work and work more. The WPTC would provide Earned Income Tax Credit recipient households with earnings of at least $10,000 from work a fully refundable tax […]
Working parents tax credit is good for employers
The Working Parents Tax Credit (WPTC) is designed to substantially benefit both parents and employers. It is life-changing for parents and provides at scale, strong incentives to work and work more at a time when employers are having difficulty finding reliable workers. The Working Parents Tax Credit (WPTC) would provide Earned Income Tax Credit recipient […]
How to close the 800,000 high-wage jobs gap
If Michigan had the same share of middle-class jobs as Massachusetts, it would be the equivalent of adding nearly 800,000 middle-class jobs to the state economy. Michigan––a state that once attracted people from across the planet to get high-wage jobs––is now a state where seven in ten Michigan jobs pay less than middle-class wages ($65,000 […]
Michigan in 39th, Minnesota is 12th
For nearly two decades we have recommended that Michigan make Minnesota the model for its economic policy. We chose Minnesota because year after year after year it is the most prosperous Great Lakes state. It not only is a neighboring state, it also is a cold weather state and a non-costal state. The recently released […]
My Senate child care hearing testimony
Thank you Chair Irwin and members of the Senate Housing and Human Services Committee for the opportunity to talk to you about child care and our working parents tax cut recommendation. Thank you Senator McDonald Rivet for your leadership on the issue. For more than three decades, Michigan Future, Inc. has championed common sense and […]
The paucity of high-wage middle-skills jobs
Conventional wisdom has it that there are myriads of high-wage jobs that don’t require a B.A. but do require something more than a high school degree. These jobs are labelled middle-skills jobs. The claim of so many high-wage middle-skills jobs is a central component of the you don’t need a B.A. messaging that students––particularly non-affluent […]