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...
Read more »
The state’s monthly revenue report for February was released today and my reaction was, “Recovery? What recovery?” This statement from the report sums it up well: “Revenue from Michigan’s General Fund and School Aid Fund earmarked taxes totaled $474.3 million in February, down 28.8% from last year’s level . . . February tax collections...
Read more »
Why doesn’t the media do any investigating any more? Among today’s headlines is the story that Governor Granholm is delaying the school funding cut of $127 per pupil because the state’s November property tax revenues were $150 million higher than expected. Property taxes are among the most stable forms of government revenue, so such...
Read more »
The October revenue report for the state of Michigan has been released, and there’s very little good news to be had. Revenues were again below the most recent projections. October saw tax collections that were $31 million below expectations. The best real-time indicators of economic activity, sales taxes and income tax withholding, are both...
Read more »
The latest monthly state revenue report was finally released today, and it doesn’t look good. A few of the money quotes: The revenue collected from Michigan’s General Fund and School Aid Fund earmarked taxes totaled $1.3 billion in May, which was down 13.4% from last year’s level. This marked the fourth consecutive month that...
Read more »
Ouch! The Senate Fiscal Agency just released their February report of state revenue and it’s a doozy. A couple of quotes: While tax collections in February were expected to fall below last year’s level, due primarily to the impact of the economic recession, the decline was much worse than expected . . . In addition, tax collections...
Read more »
Today it was announced that Michigan’s unemployment rate hit 11.6%. What is governor Granholm’s reaction? She announces her support for an increase in gas taxes! Great idea! She has already succeeded in increasing the income tax by 12% and increasing business taxes by 22%. That seems to be working out really well. Not....
Read more »
It was only a matter of time. Now that the Congress and US Treasury have decided that it is legitimate for the Federal Government to spend $700 billion “bailing out” various banks and financial companies, the line is getting longer of those holding their hands out for free money from heaven. First, we were...
Read more »
We must bail out Ford, General Motors, and Chrysler because they are far too large to fail. This short video does an excellent job of explaining how it will all work:
Read more »
Today Volkswagen announced that they will not be building a new car factory in Michigan. They opted to Tennessee instead. According to the article: Chattanooga won the site because of incentives and tax breaks offered by Tennessee and better infrastructure, the person said. Alabama was a close second while Michigan had been out of...
Read more »
