"... for health insurance and pensions and a union with drastically less negotiating power. For Mr. Fulton, like many business executives, running a company on the Minnesota side has meant bracing for new business taxes and higher income taxes."
Mr. Fulton, a third-generation foundryman, has worked in Minnesota long enough to recall the decision to open the Duluth operation in 1980, a period when life looked much the same on either side of the border, many say.
“Knowing then what we know now, would we even do it in the state of Minnesota anywhere?” said Mr. Fulton, the president of ME Global, which operates the foundry. “I doubt it. We would go to another location. It’s an expensive place to do business.”
From a NYT article titled
"Twinned Cities Now Following Different Paths." Duluth is on the Minnesota side of the St. Louis River, and, on the Wisconsin side, the city is Superior.
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50 comments:
Is it really so strange?
Oh the poor Smiths, deprived their ability to loot the taxpayers through State-enforced union dues benefiting Democrats in Wisconsin. No more free ride for health and retirement benefits.
Now it takes Democrat bazillionaires like Governor Dayton in Minnesota to buy elections and throw their taxpayers under the bus to pay for government extravagances. Naturally, he hopes for a permanent majority enabling permanent taxpayer-fleecing.
Even a parasite should appreciate a stronger host.
Ms. Smith makes $65K plus nearly $10K in benefits. That is huge money in the Twin Ports area.
My dad is a retired MN teacher and we chatted about things like this over Christmas. Basically, he paid throughout his career the same health and pension contributions that WI teachers are only now paying because of Act 10.
I never did like Morrissey.
Did you see the pic of the Smith's in their home? Yah, they are really "suffering".
If you work for the State, be advised that with exploding gov debt and a shrinking middle class tax base, its past time for you to find a real job in the private sector. Don't come whining to us when the gravy train stops. Its not like you couldn't see it coming.
Pretty soon we'll be comparing Wisconsin and Mississippi.
Compare that to the towns of Kittery ME and Portsmouth NH.
Income tax rates (>7.5% v. 0%, resp.) are but 1 of many impacts to those ME residents. Look up the 2000 SCOTUS decision relative to ME tax policy as well. 15 years of drama that pointed to colonial maps to re-establish the state border as the north bank of the river versus the navigable middle.
We ME residents that work in NH know what we are getting into, and if the balance tilts too much, pick up stakes and move.
It is always interesting to see how these things arise, but you have choices in a federalist nation.
What I find most interesting is that people believe there is a 'steady state' condition to anything in life. It does not exist.
What the article does leave out is that while Duluth and Superior are separated by a river, the geography of the two is night and day. Superior is flat as a pancake and Duluth is built on a towering bluff -- it's a much prettier and larger city.
The NYT should do a comparison of the twin towns of Fargo, North Dakota, and Moorhead, Minnesota, but it wouldn't fit their narrative.
Ms. Smith at one point even considered stopping her dues, even though her husband is on the union’s labor management committee. “I got to wondering,” Ms. Smith said, “what am I paying for?”
You're paying for your Union Leaders expensive salaries, of course.
Given that the Union Leaders have piloted the ship right to where it's at right now, with the Legislature hostile to all things Union, you have to wonder why new leaders aren't elected.
So I wonder how both experiments paid off? Which state is prospering better?
Three years into Mr. Walker’s term, Wisconsin lags behind Minnesota in job creation and economic growth. As a candidate, Mr. Walker promised to produce 250,000 private-sector jobs in his first term, but a year before the next election that number is less than 90,000. Wisconsin ranks 34th for job growth. Mr. Walker’s defenders blame the higher spending and taxes of his Democratic predecessor for these disappointments, but according to Forbes’s annual list of best states for business, Wisconsin continues to rank in the bottom half.
Along with California, Minnesota is the fifth fastest growing state economy, with private-sector job growth exceeding pre-recession levels. Forbes rates Minnesota as the eighth best state for business. Republicans deserve some of the credit, particularly for their commitment to education reform. They also argue that Minnesota’s new growth stems from the low taxes and reduced spending under Mr. Dayton’s Republican predecessor, Tim Pawlenty. But Minnesota’s job growth was subpar during Mr. Pawlenty’s eight-year tenure and recovered only under Mr. Dayton.
Turns out busting unions, expanding poverty, and mandated ultrasounds don't create jobs.
TosaGuy, any real comparison of both will note that both Fargo and Duluth are the historic centers and are developed to a level their smaller twins are not. Fargo and Duluth are nicer, larger towns, the only think Superior/Moorhead have is cheap land and a drive.
I've lived in the Fargo area and visited the Duluth area many many times over the last 20 years. Superior is clearly the least of all four cities.
Superior is clearly the least of all four cities.
So Superior is inferior?
I wonder why garage mahal doesn't provide a link - is his source some obviously untrustworthy partisan group?
Right vs. Left in the Midwest
"is his source some obviously untrustworthy partisan group?"
Worse. His link goes to MiniTru. Be warned.
Mark,
I've been to Duluth countless times. Duluth is by far the larger and better city in every respect. You couldn't pay me to live in Superior. The NYT doesn't fully capture the inherent differences between the two....they only use the towns as a background of a political narrative they want to manufacture.
The MPLS Star-Trib has a story a few months ago about Fargo-Moorhead. I couldn't find it for citation.
As far as Garage's "contribution", MN and WI have a drastically different history of settlement and economic growth beginning with the fact that the Twin Cities is a regional metropolitan hub for the entire upper Midwest, while Milwaukee emerged as a manufacturing center in Chicago's shadow. The farming and mining histories and their impact on the state are also striking. In many respects, Minnesota has less to overcome with regard to transitioning to post-industrial economy than does Wisconsin.
Here's a quick Google of California+job+growth
California adds jobs, but unemployment rate rises to 8.9% - latimes ...
www.latimes.com/.../la-fi-california-jobs-20130921,0,5426857....
by Ricardo Lopez - in 59 Google+ circles
Sep 20, 2013 - Earlier this year, California was outpacing the nation's rate of job creation, with payroll growth hovering around 2%. But since August 2012, the ...
...
Immigrants drive CA's higher growth rate | UTSanDiego.com
www.utsandiego.com/.../california-population-growth-immigran...
by Chris Nichols
Dec 12, 2013 - At 0.88 of a percent, this past year's growth rate pales when compared ... California's high housing costs and relative scarcity of jobs continue to ...
...
[PDF]
California Jobs and Growth - CMS
cms.cerritos.edu/uploads/cerritostrainsu/California_Jobs_Report.pdf
Our jobs and growth plan for California includes the follow actions: ... income tax rate of 10.3% (the second highest in the nation), to a corporate tax rate of 8.84% ...
California's Job Growth Outpaces Texas's - Businessweek
www.businessweek.com/articles/.../californias-job-growth-outpaces-texas...
Sep 6, 2012 - California still has the country's third-highest unemployment rate, at 10.7 percent, compared with Texas's 7.2 percent. And although job growth ...
Jobs a'plenty in CA for servants, nannies, and toilers in the farm fields!
Mark,
Kansas City's situation doesn't fit that model. But truth be told, the comparisons of all the cities that make up the metro are far more complex on both sides of the state line. This is made even more complex by the Kansas suburbs of Kansas City Missouri collectively making up Kansas' largest population center even though the urban core is on the other side of the state line.
But to the point of the article, both states take care of their own when it comes to taxing out of state residents working within their borders.
Maybe Smith should get a public sector job in MN.
From the article:
"Far from leading to the paralysis that has caused debt-limit brinkmanship and government shutdown in Washington, one-party control has turned state capitals into feverish testing grounds for the nation’s most-debated policies, on the left and even more so on the right."
That's one of the classic (and most compelling) justifications for federalism. It's one of the most telling ways American government differs from that of the major European countries.
How that that get into the New York Times?
Next up in NYT: Detroit vs. Windsor, Ontario.
Are you a wealthy GOP donor who hates paying child support and wish to bypass the courts? The WisGOP is your friend.
It meant getting scalped in Detroit.
Obamacare addresses neither affordability nor availability of medical care. It is a revenue generation scheme designed to obfuscate stagnant or recessive economies and preserve the status quo. It is critical for districts which are highly financed and subsidized. Democrats are especially vulnerable in high density population centers where there are large disparities in capital and labor distributions, and a exceptionally high cost-of-living.
Duluth is also kind of a cool little city-and pretty while Superior is a total shithole.
It's always interesting to read garage's links. You have to work to find these partisan diatribes. If you think California is an ideal situation for a state, you are not alone, except you need Spanish.
Garage: hate paying child support and wish to bypass the courts?
Be careful what you invoke. You may get more than you expected.
garage mahal,
I think that child support is a mess.
On the one hand, you have guys who quit stressful-but-high-paying jobs in the wake of a divorce for lower-paying but more comfortable work, but are held to child support orders predicated on their previous income. Note that if they were still married, there would be no legal issue here; there's no requirement that anyone who has a high income has to keep earning it.
(In the same vein, no one can force you to pony up for your child's college education -- if you are married; your legal responsibilities stop after age 18. But IIRC divorced men have been made to pay for their children's college tuition.)
On the other hand, you have women who assume that marrying money means that you will always have a steady stream of it, whether you are still married or not. And child support is pegged to the expected income stream, not to what is actually required to support a child.
It seems to me that (a) a change in the income of the person owing child support ought to result in a change in the amount owed; (b) no burdens ought to be imposed on a person owing child support that could not also be imposed if the couple were still legally married; and (c) child support ought to be tied to actual support of the child. That means that the parent receiving it ought to be able to document how it is spent; also that there ought to be a reasonable upper limit to required support. That you happened to, say, marry and then divorce Barry Bonds does not entitle you or your kids to $20K/month of "child support" just because Barry Bonds can afford it.
Crain's Chicago Biz January 2013:
Pension funding WI - 100%
MN - in the 70s
I'm glad someone brought up California. I was wondering if the Professor would care to comment on the land grab the caring, credentialed elite rulers are trying to do.
Basically, eminent domain the entire state.
You don't own private property anymore, your property will be considered "open space" and you will be dictated to on usage.
Found the link via a comment from an Instapundit post. Protein Wisdom has a 10 min. vid of the proceedings.
Typical elitist arrogance abounds. We worked on this for 6 months!
We're looking at this from the 30,000 foot view.
California’s Senate Bill 1 is what the founding fathers fought against. Straight from the U.N. Agenda 21’s playbook, SB1 will give power to a county to form a “Sustainable Communities Investment Authority” (SCIA). These Authorities have the power of eminent domain and can confiscate private property to build “sustainable communities.” The bill essentially paves the way for the loss of any true private property in California, resulting in the loss of freedom and driving down home values. If the Senate passes the modified bill, only Governor Jerry Brown (D – CA) will stand in its way of becoming law. This means that city and county governments can create unelected bureaucracies with the power to do what’s necessary to create “sustainable communities.” It also means that the definition of “blight” will change from the original definition of abandoned and decaying buildings on residential lots to a much wider definition including anything the bureaucracies need to create sustainable communities. Not only would the government be able to use eminent domain to procure land for public transportation, it could take private homes within half a mile of that public transportation in the name of creating a sustainable community. A private home is not really private if it could be taken at any time to create low income, low energy housing. [...] According to Lawrence J. McQuillan, “each Authority will be granted powers to build “Sustainable Communities” means jamming people into dense, urban centers using high-density residential housing and high-intensity retail and commercial buildings near mass transit corridors. To that end, SB 1 will grant each Authority unprecedented powers.” - See more at: http://proteinwisdom.com/#sthash.IqEUkQOC.dpuf
read the article, but it seemed to me that every argument for the minnesota method was based on emotion and how it made people feel. rather than the hard realities. It also glossed over the new taxes in Minnesota.
As someone else mentioned, they conveniently leave out that moving over to the Minnesota side would cost the Smiths more in taxes. If she earns $65k and her husband earned even half that (assume for argument's sake a $100k family income) the additional income tax alone would amount to over $1000 per year. That'll eat into the affordability of those insurance premiums real fast...
"Take new bill introduced by the planet known as Joel Kleefisch - AB 540. It was a controversial bill right away - repealing child custody determinations, allegedly to make them fairer to divorced fathers. It was the child support provision - allowing judges to not consider income above $150,000 in calculating child support payments - that caught everyone's attention"
Gee Garage, you're right! The WI GOP is the friend to men and the foe to woman who conflate child support with alimony and spousal support.
RE: Cities straddling state lines
One of the most peculiar is Wendover, UT and West Wendover, Nevada. The parking lots of two casinos are smack up against the state line!
Wendover, Utah is a dump. Residents of both voted to have Nevada annex the town (with the proper approvals of the two states and congress), but the Wendover, Utah mayor broke a tie over the measure. The rest of Utah cried.
The Wisconsin Capitol is an elaborate whorehouse. Big donors are lining up for this gravy train as Republicans heap taxpayer cash upon them. Hell, the taxpayer pays for their own campaigns. Griftopia.
Re: Child Support
In most states child support is determined by formulas which are completely absurd. The more disparate the incomes of the two parents, even if the lower earning parent is still making a good living, the worse the absurdity. I believe it crosses into involuntary servitude.
Child support also undermines the non-custodial, but still actively involved parent (which is most.) It often ends up creating fights over expenses and who pays them. For example, in my state, if I bought my daughter some clothes, my ex is supposed to reimburse me. (I see my youngest a lot and I often make dinner for her--technically, I should be reimbursed. Not going to happen.)
My case is bad enough in the amounts (even my ex thought the calculation absurd, though takes it and broke a verbal promise to put a certain amount in an educational savings fund); a former boss's ex is a registered nurse who is deliberately underemployed in order to keep that income level different. A former colleague's ex gets a chunk of her salary paid under-the-table for the same reason.
I propose that the charts be made more flexible and realistic AND that the child support money be put into a trust and require the receiving parent to submit receipts! The leftover money at eighteen could be treated the same as an education savings account.
Garage, all state and national capitals are whorehouses. The major disagreement between political parties is who gets the goodies, not that the goodies should be reduced all around. Seems that this is your grievance as well.
"Three years into Mr. Walker’s term, Wisconsin lags behind Minnesota in job creation and economic growth."
Obama has been the president for 5 years, and everything bad in the US economy is still blamed on president Bush. Not so for the governors - they have immediate effect on the economy.
"As a candidate, Mr. Walker promised to produce 250,000 private-sector jobs in his first term, but a year before the next election that number is less than 90,000. "
Politifact (a liberal publication) rates this claim as false...
Politifact: That brings the total number of jobs added since he took office to an estimated 104,372, or about 42 percent of the total the governor promised.
"They also argue that Minnesota’s new growth stems from the low taxes and reduced spending under Mr. Dayton’s Republican predecessor, Tim Pawlenty. But Minnesota’s job growth was subpar during Mr. Pawlenty’s eight-year tenure and recovered only under Mr. Dayton."
Unemployment in November 2009:
Minnesota: 7.9%
Wisconsin: 9.1%
Republican-run Minnesota was much better than Democrat-run Wisconsin. Weird. Sounds like Pawlenty did something right, didn't he?
"Pension funding WI - 100%
MN - in the 70s"
Yep. See page 3.
The last one for garage...
Minnesota reached peak unemployment in June 2009, and it stood at 8.5%
Wisconsin had a two-peak unemployment, the last one in Jan. 31, 2010, and it was 9.2%.
Both Minnesota and Wisconsin saw recoveries before the new governors did anything, and Minnesota has a head start of 9 months, and it had lower unemployment peak, and low unemployment historically.
NYT that garage quoted clearly did not do its homework, and is rated as "false" by the FactChecker because it failed ot provide proper perspective.
"Politifact: That brings the total number of jobs added since he took office to an estimated 104,372, or about 42 percent of the total the governor promised."
Also, it brings the amount of propaganda BS peddled by Garage up to 86%
Related- In terms of economic freedom of nations, the United States falls from the list of the top 10.
Related- In terms of economic freedom of nations, the United States falls from the list of the top 10.
bandmeeting wrote:
I never did like Morrissey.
Morrisey was and is a complete wanker and tosser.
but The Smiths were still pretty good despite him.Probably because of Johnny Marr's guitar more than anything.
But ok, some of Morrisey's lyrics were also pretty decent as far as lyrics go.
Vocally he was one note, but serviceable.
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