Grand Rapids Pundit’s Michigan Economy Tracker index has been updated. The state’s sales tax revenue level dropped 0.4% from July of last year. This is particularly bad, because the Michigan Economy Tracker tells us year over year growth. The problem is that July 2009 was the bottom of 2009′s sales tax revenue decline. Although...
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The perpetually positive Realtors of the world are essentially always saying that it’s a good time to buy. The government made it a matter of national policy, through the wasteful “home buyer’s tax credit,” to get more people to buy houses. But is it really a good time to buy? One thing that I...
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Just as we were warned by Grand Rapids’ police chief before this year’s income tax hike that a failure of the tax increase would result in ‘increased risk’ for city residents, the Police union in Bay, Michigan is actually threatening residents that they will be “beaten, shot, stabbed robbed” if the city doesn’t...
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I’ve added a tab to the GR Pundit web site with what I’ve created and now call the “Michigan Sales Tax Revenue Index.” You can view it by clicking on the tab above. This index is a three month average (to smooth the volatility) of the state’s sales tax revenue. Any number above zero...
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I’ve created a new chart, which will be updated monthly,showing the balance of the city’s combined pension plans in comparison with the stock market, tracking S&P 500 index. Unfortunately, as I’ve pointed out previously, the city’s pensions are largely invested in risky assets which makes the entire plan correlate well with the markets. Please...
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No surprise here. Michigan is in the top 10 of highest property taxes of all the states. Wayne county, the highest property tax county in Michigan, is number 38 in the nation (among 790 counties). Is this a surprise? Wayne county is the most destitute, failed county – possibly in the nation. Kent county...
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We learned today, via the Grand Rapids Press, that 40% of the city of Grand Rapids’ population is on Medicaid and 34% of the city’s population is on food stamps. This is, of course, part of the surging trend of food stamp recipients across the nation, which reached a record-breaking 40,000,000 people this month....
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Most Americans probably haven’t heard of the term austerity until recently. If you lived in Europe, it would be a daily topic of discussion. Austerity essentially means being forced to live with less, particularly as it relates to government benefits. As Greece has essentially entered a period of national bankruptcy, the government is finally...
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BREAKING NEWS: State bureaucrats surprised to learn that paying people to do nothing results in more people doing nothing. From the Detroit News: Landscapers find workers choosing jobless pay But B&L Landscaping in Oak Park finds the labor pool is noticeably weaker and less motivated, director Richard Angell said, even though the company still...
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This past week the City of Grand Rapids has admitted that the pension fund deficit for this coming fiscal year (starting July 1, 2010) has gotten even worse than before. According to the Grand Rapids Press, the city’s pension plan actuary (the people who run the plan and tell the city how much needs...
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