Mr. Jack P. McHugh

At a press conference Tuesday announcing several new recipients of discriminatory state tax breaks, Gov. Jennifer Granholm repeated a number of false or misleading statements about this state government's policy of picking winners and losers, and its effects as a substitute for genuine labor, regulatory and tax law reforms.

A business operation created by the politically powerful SEIU labor union will be granted a special $2 million tax break by the state of Michigan.

There is nothing “liberal” — as opposed to partisan — about defending the perks of a privileged class of government and school employees over the interests of taxpaying families and business owners.

How do we fix Michigan? Changing the incentives that make members of the political class behave in ways that accelerate the Detroitification of Michigan is key.

Yesterday, I described an analysis performed by Mackinac Center scholars finding a correlation between public sector unionism, faster government spending growth and weaker state employment growth. The history and actual mechanism by which these sad outcomes have been realized were detailed last month in a Weekly Standard piece by professors Fred Siegel and Dan DiSalvo called, "The New Tammany Hall: Public sector unions have become a labor aristocracy — and they are bankrupting states and municipalities."

States with laws giving government employee unions greater power tend to have less economic growth and more government spending growth, according to a recent analysis by Mackinac Center scholars. The degree of public sector unionism is one of a number of theories for what causes some states to grow while others suffer economic decline, one that acquires additional weight thanks to this analysis. Policymakers looking to reverse Michigan's decade-long decline should not ignore the role these laws may play.

The Nov. 6 edition of the Gongwer Michigan Report (subscription required) describes a new "bulletin" from the Michigan Department of Treasury defining which foods are considered "prepared" and thus subject to the state sales tax — and which are not: Donuts with a napkin are, but donuts with waxed paper are not. And so on. Such hair-splitting may be a foretaste of what we can expect if this state ever imposes a sales tax on services.

A bipartisan package of bills in the Michigan Senate is poised to protect consumers from the tragedy of bad interior design. The legislation may or may not succeed in that, but it certainly will protect interior designers from the tragedy of more competition generating lower prices for consumers.

If one just looks just at the effect of her school budget cut actions and ignores the motivations, Gov. Jennifer Granholm looks like a fiscal conservative's hero right now. So where's the love? For that matter, where's the love for taxpayers from the 12 Republicans and 62 Democrats who voted yesterday to appropriate federal "stimulus" dollars plus money from proposed tax hikes to "undo" the Governor's school spending reductions?

Legislators loading (more) debt onto taxpayers to pay the health benefits of retired government employees may make many voters wonder who these pols really work for. That's the purpose of Senate Bill 927, introduced by Republican Senators Mark Jansen, Bill Hardiman and Roger Kahn. The reality the government employee unions and members want to avoid with such schemes is that there's not enough money in the world to pay these benefits, so the only questions are how big a "haircut" they'll get and when will the pols summon the guts to make the cuts.

A review and analysis of important state legislative policy issues that do not always receive attention from the general media. Michigan Capitol Confidential will make it easier to keep tabs on your elected representatives in Lansing.