Well, guess what..the people in my neck of the woods (I'm a Michigander) are right, and you are wrong on this one. Michigan has been in a single-state recession for almost five years. That's not just my opinion, either. An article in the Michigan Business Review in February 2008 reported the following:
"Michigan recorded its fourth consecutive year of recession in 2007, a bank economist concluded after reviewing labor market data. Jobs dropped 1.8 percent and the unemployment rate rose 0.4 percent in 2007, reported Dana Johnson, Chief Economist at Comerica Bank. Comerica's Michigan Business Activity Index fell 1 point in December, Johnson reported Thursday, matching the 2007 low set last January. The index averaged 10.6 last year, down 0.7 percent from 2006. "Reflecting the dismal economic backdrop, the exodus from Michigan continued to accelerate," Johnson wrote in his January state economic report. "Last year, more than 90,000 people on net moved to other states from Michigan, more than triple the number compared to just four years earlier." As a result, he said, Michigan's population dropped 0.3 percent, or by 30,000 people last year, on top of a 0.1 percent decline in 2006."
Our current unemployment rate is 8.5%. We're not imagining the problems here. They are real.
No, I’m not wrong. There are 49 other states besides Michigan that make up the United States and when you add them all up, there’s no recession.
Michigan is being hit particularly hard by the energy crisis because of the auto industry, but let’s be real... your electoral votes went to Bill Clinton in 1992 and 1996 (vetoed ANWR drilling in 1996), Al Gore in 2000 (wants to abolish the internal combustion engine), John Kerry in 2004 (voted against ANWR drilling six times) and you send Carl Levin (voted against ANWR drilling) and Debbie Stabenow (voted against ANWR) to the Senate. Everyone you elect on the national level has consistently voted against American energy independence. UAW members insist on voting in a block for socialist candidates who put environmental junk science ahead their own economic needs and then act surprised when their jobs disappear because nobody can afford to drive their cars.
I understand that oil exploration and its effect on the auto industry is just one aspect of Michigan’s problem, but it’s illustrative of Michigan’s maddening habit of voting against its own interests and then complaining that Washington isn’t doing enough to help them. If we’re making a list of states that have dug their own hole, Michigan is at or near the top of it. If you consistently vote for punitive taxes against corporations, government mandated benefits, lopsided trade deals, energy dependence and costly environmental legislation specifically designed to strangle our economy, you’re going to lose your manufacturing jobs.
This is the primary reason America is coming apart at the seams. People don’t know what they’re voting for and they don’t make any effort to understand the issues that effect them. They listen to sounds bites, wait for something that either makes them feel good or gives them someone to blame and then react. Michigan is a prime example of this.
I stand by what I said. The collective ignorance of the American people is the primary source of every one of America’s problems. We get the government we deserve.