The best path to a better Michigan economy is to build a better workforce, argues Tim Bartik, an economist at the Upjohn Institute in Kalamazoo and a time-tested member of a local school board.
Phil Power reaches a similar conclusion this week as he reports on the changing demographics — and thousands of potential hires in the next few years — in the Michigan auto industry.
And Bartik and Power both see better education as the most promising path to a better workforce.
In a new presentation called “Human Capital Initiatives to Promote State Economic Development,” Bartik says the most promising reforms include customized job training (pricetag: $70 million) and early childhood education (pricetag: $200 million to $1.5 billion).
“Early childhood education will pay for itself but only after 20 years,” Bartik estimates, and builds an argument that money could be freed to pay for education innovation if Lansing would move forward on reforms that are widely supported by many Michigan constituencies.
“The State of Michigan has structural budget deficit that has well-known solutions that need not burden business: cut prison costs, reform public employee benefits, move to graduated income tax, increase sales tax on services sold to households, and reduce favorable tax treatment of pension income,” Bartik writes.
Bartik’s fellow economist, MSU’s Charlie Ballard, has reached many of the same conclusions. So have various business groups. So did the governor’s emergency financial advisory panel of state budget experts. So has the Center for Michigan in staff-written reports. So have many of the more than 1,500 participants to date in the Michigan’s Defining Moment Public Engagement Campaign.
And… so do many individual legislators who haven’t yet found the collective will, political courage, and floor votes for significant reform.
