PLYMOUTH, MI – Brian Calley, who spent eight years as Michigan’s lieutenant governor, today runs the Small Business Association of Michigan. Last week, he brought some startling and grim news to a lunch gathering in this Detroit suburb.
Think it’s hard to find workers now? That’s because it is. Back in 2000, he said during a power point presentation, there were 30 workers for every 10 job vacancies. “Today, there are seven people looking for jobs for every ten openings — only seven.”
What’s more, he added, “there may never be a better time to hire than now,” because the situation is going to get worse. The percentage of people age 15 to 19 actually in the work force has declined by a whopping 43 percent in the last couple decades.
In fact, the percentage of those working or looking for work has declined in every section of the work force except one — those over the age of 65. That doesn’t exactly bode well for the future.
But what the crystal ball shows is even worse. Michigan doesn’t just have fewer people in the work force, if present trends continue, the state seems likely to have fewer people, period.
This crisis has been building for a long time, but it’s one that politicians and policy makers are just now noticing. Governor Gretchen Whitmer was scheduled to address the state’s population crisis at this week’s annual Mackinac conference of policy makers.
This may have been spurred by a major new study released by the state’s oldest and most respected non-affiliated “think tank,” the Citizens’ Research Council. But it’s nothing new.
Relatively speaking, Michigan has lost population relative to the rest of the nation for a long time. Half a century ago, Michigan was the seventh-largest state in the country, with 19 congressmen.
Today, it has only 13 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, and is only the tenth largest state. Back in the 1950s, Florida had less than half Michigan’s population. Now, Florida has 22 million people; Michigan barely 10 million, and dropping.
Worse, Michigan has gone from being one of the nation’s richest states to a relatively poor one, and talented people, especially young, well-educated ones, are bailing out.
The study that got everyone’s attention, “Michigan’s Path to a Prosperous Future,” was done jointly by the CRC in collaboration with another highly respected non-profit research group, Ann-Arbor based Altarum, which focuses on health and health care.
There’s no attempt at sugar coating here: “For the last five decades, Michigan has been losing ground,” it concludes. “Michigan has fallen behind other states in population growth, jobs earnings, health, educational achievement and the quality of public services at the state and local levels.”
The thoroughly researched report goes on to document, in awesome and damning detail, what happened and why. In the early and mid-twentieth century, the rise of the automotive industry made the state “one of the most prosperous states in the country and, in fact, among the most prosperous places in the world.”
But, as is well known, “globalization allowed manufacturers access to cheaper labor both in other regions and other countries.”
That gradually drained resources, and inability to cope with that resulted in what is now called the “Lost Decade” of 2000-2010; the so-called Great Recession of 2007-10 actually started in Michigan much earlier.
Unemployment soared and wages fell, and state leaders coped with that by slashing services, and then slashing taxes in an effort to attract new businesses. That, however, was hampered by a drastic decline in state services, especially perhaps school funding, and decaying infrastructure — including roads.
How bad has it been? Michigan now ranks in the bottom third of all states, measured by indicators like per capita income. State revenue this fiscal year, adjusted for inflation, is expected to be 22 percent less than in 2000.
As a result, people, especially new college graduates, are fleeing the state. There is hope, however, and a clear path to regained prosperity. Immigration, mostly from abroad. Despite myths to the contrary, those who come here from other countries tend to be hard-working and job creators.
Brian Calley, the small business expert, thinks it would help to eliminate all country quotas and instead encourage the highly trained people we need to come to Michigan. “Someone from Sweden could move here tomorrow,” he said. “But there’s a long backlog for those from India,” including those with valuable skills.
Michigan does have some hidden assets — much of the state is particularly beautiful, the climate is usually good, and there is no threat of major earthquakes or drought. Perhaps Michigan’s biggest asset is that thanks to the Great Lakes, water will never be a problem, something booming communities in the west can only envy.
Indeed, the report indicates that “climate change may offer huge opportunities for Michigan,” as some parts of the country become increasingly inhospitable and “families may seek milder and safer environments.”
But true prosperity will only be possible if the state finds a way to hang on to more of its own people and attract large numbers of immigrants. In fact, immigrants already account for all the modest population growth of the last few years.
The native population is already aging, shrinking, and beginning to record more deaths than births. That can be turned around, the experts claim, but only if government and the private sector “come together to invest in Michiganders, invest in the services and natural resources of our state, and work to attract new people.”
The alternative would look something like West Virginia, or worse. The report doesn’t say that. It didn’t have to.
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(Editor’s Note: A version of this column also appeared in the Toledo Blade.)
