In the closing days of 2013, long-time Michigan political pundit Tim Skubick opined that a "disease" was affecting Lansing: "tax-cut fever."
What about tax hike fever, Mr. Skubick?
In the past year, lawmakers here have talked much more about how to reach deeper into the pockets of Michigan citizens. They've done some actual reaching, too — and Michigan politicians aren't the only ones.
Labor Policy Director F. Vincent Vernuccio was a guest on Fox Business on Dec. 26 discussing how a higher minimum wage leads to fewer jobs. You can read more about the issue here.
United Van Lines gave the Associated Press an early look at its annual inbound versus outbound household move statistics for 2013, and the news for Michigan looks fantastic.
For the first time in 16 years, Michigan is no longer in the “high-outbound” moves category, defined by United Van Lines (UVL) as 55 percent or more of customer traffic leaving a particular state.
Executive Vice President Michael J. Reitz today in The Detroit News responded to an attack against the Center written last week by AFL-CIO President Karla Swift.
National Review Online exposed several instances in Swift’s commentary that directly lifted language from another publication without attribution. Watchdog.org connects Swift’s attacks to a publication put out by the Center for Media and Democracy, a Michigan-specific version of which was found to have instances of plagiarism in it.
Michigan legislators missed 1,093 votes in 2013, according to the new “Missed Votes Report” compiled by Jack McHugh, editor of MichiganVotes.org.
That is in stark comparison to the 21,000 votes lawmakers missed during the 2001-2002 legislative session when MichiganVotes.org first started.
Fiscal Policy Director Michael LaFaive is cited in today’s Detroit News editorial about the need for the city of Detroit to make it easier to open a small business.
“Lots of small businesses have the potential to be the next big thing, but government has to get out of their way,” LaFaive said, noting that city hall should not treat business owners as suspect.
An Associated Press story about the potential for worker freedom laws to be passed in Ohio, Oregon and Missouri that cites Labor Policy Director F. Vincent Vernuccio has been posted by no fewer than 60 media outlets nationwide, including The Washington Post, St. Louis Dispatch and The Oregonian.
Manny Lopez, managing editor of Michigan Capitol Confidential, was a guest on “Let it Rip” Sunday morning on FOX2 Detroit, discussing the claim by unions that the exclusive monopoly as bargaining representatives the unions themselves sought now amounts to “slavery” because they have to represent workers who exercise their right-to-work freedoms.
Labor Policy Director F. Vincent Vernuccio writes in today’s Lansing State Journal about the one-year anniversary of Michigan’s right-to-work law passing, and what the law means — and doesn’t mean — to the state.
Mackinac Center Legal Foundation Director Patrick J. Wright and Coopersville kindergarten teacher Miriam Chanski were guests on “The Sean Hannity Show” that aired Friday on Fox News. They discussed the unfair labor practice complaints the legal foundation filed with the Michigan Employment Relations Commission on behalf of Chanski and seven other public school employees against their local unions and the Michigan Education Association over the refusal by the unions to allow the educators to exercise their worker freedom rights.
Due to late sessions and a crowded year-end agenda, some of this week's votes will be included in a supplemental roll call report next week. Except for pro-forma adjournment and "opening day" sessions on Dec. 13 and Jan. 8, respectively, the Legislature will not return for regular business until mid-January.
National Review Online today highlights two cases in which the Mackinac Center Legal Foundation is protecting teachers from their unions.
The first involves several teachers around the state who are being denied their ability to exercise their worker freedom rights by the Michigan Education Association. The union claims that its bylaws limiting teachers to resigning their membership only during the month of August trumps Michigan’s right-to-work law.
Michigan embraced worker freedom one year ago today with the adoption of a right-to-work law, becoming the 24th state in the nation to do so. Mackinac Center analysts had called for the state to allow workers to be free from financially supporting a union as a condition of employment for two decades.
Michael LaFaive, director of the Morey Fiscal Policy Initiative, was cited in both The Detroit News and Detroit Free Press on the $10.5 billion loss incurred by taxpayers after the federal government sold the final stock shares it owned in General Motors.
Research by Fiscal Policy Director Michael LaFaive and Adjunct Scholar Todd Nesbit on cigarette smuggling was recently cited in Pacific Standard. The magazine cites in particular their finding that the state of New York has the highest cigarette smuggling rate in the nation, and has increased some 70 percent since 2006 due to high tobacco excise taxes.
Senate Bill 636, Facilitate "land line" phone service transition to cell phones
To streamline regulations on "landline" telephone service providers to facilitate transitioning customers to a wireless (cell phone or VOIP) system, and allow phone companies to discontinue landline service after 2016. The bill authorizes appeal procedures for individual customers for whom the replacement service does not work well.
The United States is spending more and getting less when it comes to education.
On a test designed to compare student outcomes by country, children in the U.S. scored poorly. The test, the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), is administered by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and includes 34 OECD countries, including South Korea, China, France and Germany.
Exactly one year ago today, on Dec. 6, 2012, the Michigan Legislature took the first bold steps to grant freedom to workers who did not want to be forced to financially support a union as a condition of employment, passing bills that would make Michigan the 24th right-to-work state in the country.
The Michigan Education Association has been accused of hiding from teachers how to leave the union and threatening their credit ratings if they don’t pay dues.
The union says teachers can only leave in the month of August and that this is in their bylaws.
Audrey Spalding, director of education policy, is co-author of a commentary about the need for a statewide system for measuring student growth that recently ran in Bridge Magazine, a publication from The Center for Michigan.
The authors suggest a system that takes into account teacher effectiveness and the socio-economic status of students.
Fiscal Policy Director Michael LaFaive and Labor Policy Director F. Vincent Vernuccio were both cited in a Washington Free Beacon story about the latest developments in Detroit’s bankruptcy proceedings.
Federal Judge Steven Rhodes ruled Tuesday that the city’s bankruptcy can proceed and that pensions could be cut as a way to reduce a $20 billion overspending crisis.
Michigan has the strongest restrictions on branded barware in the nation and the Legislature is considering whether it should turn those administrative rules into law.
When politicians are voting on a bill that would forbid bars and restaurants from receiving products with brand logos on them, it is easy to understand the cynicism of politics. How many people in the state really care whether pint glasses and napkins have promotional items printed on them?
Thursday is Thanksgiving, which is also affectionately called “Turkey Day.”
This year Thanksgiving marks the 150th anniversary of its settled place on the American calendar. On Oct. 3, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln issued a proclamation establishing the fourth Thursday in November as a national day of thanksgiving. He issued the proclamation on Oct. 3 for a reason.
Two months after news coverage spurred a bidding war on Eminem's childhood home, a Michigan government agency demolished it.
More than 120 bids were made on the former home of the Michigan native and entertainer. One fan wanted to turn it into a museum, according to an article on MLive.
Anticipated Black Friday protests of Walmart later this week most likely involve few actual employees and plenty of people involved with union front groups, according to the Mackinac Center’s labor policy director.
“Their success comes from the media covering it, regardless of how many workers walk out,” F. Vincent Vernuccio told The Washington Free Beacon. “And there won’t be many workers on Black Friday, just like last year.”
