My Top 10 Reasons Not to Vote for the Nerd

1. He considers seniors his personal piggy bank. Just as I not so gracefully eased into what's generally called my “senior” years, I learned that our new governor, the Nerd, had invented new ways to raise my taxes. To make up for the $1,650,000,000 tax break he gave to businesses, he imposed (ignoring the State Constitution) taxes on the pensions of public service retirees (which my wife receives), phased in new taxes on all retirees, and eliminated the Homestead Tax Credit which had eased the tax burden on seniors nice enough to stay in Michigan to spend their Social Security money. What will that cost seniors? The pension tax changes cost seniors $343,000,000 in 2012/2013, and the Homestead Property Tax Credit added $336,820,000 to the state's bank account.
2. Won't tell us how he'll raise money to fix the roads. I'll bet the Nerd wished he'd
   
   left his mouth shut last winter when he said he'd like to fix Michigan's crappy roads. As leader of the party in charge of the state, everyone expected something to happen for the roads. Except the GOP is so quiet about fixing the roads you can hear crickets chirping all the way from Tampa. It's an election year and fixing the roads will cost BIG money. And guess where they're going to get it? You know it, I know it and they know it. But they ain't talking.
   
3. His business friendly agenda has run out of gas. For all his tax changes, shifting the upkeep of the state to the citizens while businesses smile on their way to the bank, the fact is that the changes have simply not produced jobs the way Snyder and Co. had predicted. "It's fair to say that job growth has been slower in Michigan after the tax shift went into effect than the first year of Gov. Snyder's administration," said Charles Ballard, an economics professor at Michigan State University.
   According to Bridge Magazine, what has happened under the tax shift is:
   a) Roads: “Worst roads in the nation,” a 15 percent drop in state investment in transportation systems from 2004 to 2014.
   b) City services: “4,000 fewer firefighters and police in Michigan communities”. Local revenue sharing has declined 31 percent from 2004 to 2014
   c)Children: 16 percent decline in K-12 investment from 2004 to 2014, leading to elimination of arts, music, larger classes, and diminished quality
   d)Higher education: “College tuitions have doubled,” and a 29-percent real investment drop in higher education funding from 2004 to 2014
   e)Outdoors: “Miles of polluted rivers has doubled; beach closures are up 22% over past 5 years.” Conservation funding down 6 percent from 2004 to 2014.
   f)Income: “Biggest fall in family incomes in the nation.” Michigan has fallen from 19th to 37th in the nation in personal incomes from 2004 to 2014.
   
4. The Nerd takes credit for Michigan's comeback. A lot of analysts are skeptical that Michigan has actually “come back”. Remembering that the Nerd took office in early 2011, the following charts to the right show that somehow any “comeback” Michigan has realized started well before he even announced his candidacy and the graphs level off after 2012.  
5. His idea to end “item pricing” in stores isn't working. And what was his problem with putting prices on the things we shop for? I mean, I know the Nerd has a “special relationship” with the Meijer company, but we elected him. Ending item pricing was going to save us money? Have any of you taken that dream vacation that all those savings should have paid for? The fact is that posting correct prices on the stores' shelves ain't happening. As a senior I pinch pennies and clip coupons when I shop, and I'll bet I could find 20 items not priced or improperly priced on the shelves in 30 minutes or less in any of the grocery stores I frequent (especially the Big M). Actually, I'll bet the Nerd $100 that I can do it. The lack of item pricing isn't an actual tax, but at the end of the day, you've spent more for things than you would have 4 years ago.
   
   
   
6. School funding? Don't get me started! His accounting change puts more money in the education budget, but it doesn't get to the classroom, it funds retirement accounts! Funding a retirement plan and calling it education spending may be technically accurate, but your kid and your schools aren't benefiting from it. Click on the chart to see how Michigan compares to other states.
7. He apparently considers pensions unearned luxuries. As long as we're talking about pensions, let's continue. The Nerd doesn't like pensions; the 1% never do. While constitutionally obligated to protect the guaranteed pensions of public service employees, one of his first moves was to unconstitutionally tax them.
   The constitution states, “The accrued financial benefits of each pension plan and retirement system of the state and its political subdivisions shall be a contractual obligation thereof which shall not be diminished or impaired thereby. “ Our Attorney General Bill Schuette is not going to side with the citizens on this so I won't be voting for him either.
   Not being satisfied with that sleight of hand, after Michigan voters overwhelmingly
   

   

   voted (53% to 47%) against state appointed emergency managers to take over local governments, Snyder and his GOP cronies thumbed their nose at the voters and started appointing emergency managers. And when Kevyn Orr came to Detroit as an emergency manager, what was the first thing out of his mouth? “We have to cut pension benefits.” The Nerd had hired a hit man to take the heat off himself.
   State employees had better hunker down if the Nerd is re-elected. Just guess what his solution will be to fix Michigan's underfunded (13^th worst in the US) pension account.
8. Marie Antoinette was beheaded for saying the starving in Paris should just eat some cake. Snyder says, “Let them eat maggots.” And if you think he dislikes pensions, wait until you hear how he feels about unions! In an effort to break the union that provided food services to the state's incarcerated, he negotiated a contract with Aramark to take over those jobs from the state employees. In short order it was discovered that Aramark was feeding prisoners spoiled food to the point of maggot infestations, Aramark employees were enjoying sex acts with the prisoners, and smuggling drugs into the prisons. The Nerd doesn't see any problem, however, and when the state fined Aramark, the Nerd told them he was the boss and they didn't really, actually, legally have to pay the fine. (Michigan was proud to contribute to Aramark CEO Eric J. Foss over $18,000,000 compensation in 2013).
9. He perfected electioneering without specifics 4 years ago but demands specifics from his opponent. In a new set of ads, Mark Schauer is attacked for envisioning a better Michigan without spreadsheets spread out in front of him. But this is exactly how the Nerd got elected in 2008...he stood for change without going into any detail! If he'd said, I'm going to shift taxes, break unions, and fatally wound the pension system, he never would have been elected. He's not providing much detail this election either (transportation funding?) so somehow only one candidate gets to run on their vision, the other needs to have mapped out his daily schedule for the next 4 years.
10. He punished the victims during the Great Recession. While the Federal government bailed out the very bankers that precipitated the Great Recession and found money to ensure the continued operations of the multi-national auto makers that had been poorly managed, those unfortunate enough to be jobless in Michigan, where the state's unemployment rate was the highest in 70 years, found themselves SOL when the Nerd cut unemployment benefits to (again) save money for corporations.
    There are a ton of other reasons not to vote for him of course. His transparency pledge ended with the revelation his 2010 campaign received “dark money”, money of undisclosed origins, except to the group that's getting it of course. He's given a few no bid contracts, some of which benefited family members, others to supporters. I consider these character flaws, not uncommon to many who hold power.
    In the same way that Snyder's election was a repudiation of the Granholm years, my vote will be a repudiation of the Snyder era, where bad policies that failed in other states have been blindly implemented here in Michigan.
    Michigan didn't need a Nerd to represent the 1%. As George W. Bush showed us, that doesn't work. You simply can't crush the middle class and expect a thriving economy.
    Michigan needed a Nerd to fight for the middle class. We got a rich politician instead.

Apparently There's Educational Funding, and Then There's Educational Funding

This whole “Yes you did!”, “No I didn't!” thing is getting old. How are we supposed to know who's lying and who's not if all we get is sound-bites in 30 second political ads?

First of all, the Nerd says he's increased education funding. He did.

Mark Schauer says that the Nerd cut school funding. And he did.

 The confusion stems from the Schauer definition of education funding as money that actually finds it's way into a school building.

The Nerd's first budget (2012) cut $930.6 million dollars from the education fund. He had to because businesses got a big tax break, remember? The state dropped $300 from it's per pupil support, a move that was exacerbated by the end of the Federal Stimulus money which had equaled $170 per pupil. Net loss: $470/pupil. And in addition to losing federal per pupil funding, schools also lost $316 million of federal job training money meaning the state would no longer receive around half million federal dollars per year that the Nerd had no intention of replacing. Must be the “structural change' he campaigned about in 2010.

But to offset that, the Nerd promised an additional $100 per student for schools that adopted a “best practices”(presumably because some schools thought “worst practices” were acceptable) and a quick shot in the Education Retirement fund of $455 million.

Snyder claims he's been increasing education funding since that disastrous first year. But

one of the ways he bolsters his argument is by including state contributions to the education retirement (MPSERS) fund as additional education spending (not as in classroom spending, though). Which is the kind of logic that says, “I can't believe I ran out of gas this afternoon! I just put air in the tires yesterday!” Actually the MPSERS problem started when Jolly Johnny Engler put MPSERS in the hole with some budget cuts twenty years ago.

Snyder's biggest ally in per pupil funding has been the state's declining student population, which I don't actually regard as a good thing, but it is what it is. (It also helps the Nerd because a declining population makes the unemployment numbers look better). Spending a little more each year for fewer students increases per student spending.

So while the Nerd takes credit for vastly increased spending (he claims $660 per student increase) $366 per student never sees a school building because it goes into the MPSERS retirement fund. Add in the $214 per pupil boost from shrinking student enrollment and Snyder has increased student spending by a whopping $180 per pupil.

 And then there's the Foundation Allowance. At one time it was another way of saying “per pupil” spending, but in a few magical strokes of the pen, it doesn't anymore. Jolly Johnny Engler and crew invented the Foundation Allowance, but even the medieval policy wonks at the Mackinac Center have a hard time explaining it and their attempt to decipher it seems intentionally obfuscated.

Foundation spending dropped from $7,146 in 2011 to $7,026 in 2014, but I think that just means that they didn't want to exceed that figure. There was no danger of that. The ramifications of the Proposal A tax changes are profound and echo even today. I guess you would call Engler's masterpiece “destructural change”.

If anyone tries to tell you that the schools must be getting more money because the Foundation Allowance has been growing (but it's still lower than in 2005), ask them if your school district receives the full per pupil allocation of the allowance. Yeah, mine neither.

Is the education budget growing? Yes. Is there more money flowing into the classrooms? Not so much.

So what to make from all the “he said, she said”ads? If you're a teacher crabbing about lowered student funding for your school, that's the truth.

And if you're in an ad as a retired teacher, you're already paying higher state taxes courtesy of the Nerd so thank god he's trying to ensure your future. And that's the truth.

But constitutionally, shoring up MPSERS had to be done, and by jockeying the way the money gets into MSPERS the Nerd can call it education spending. Hey if he wants to bring in Campbell soup labels and call it education funding, who's going to stop him?

C'mon Nerd, How Ya Goin' To Fix the Roads?

Four years ago we elected a candidate for governor who was so vague about his agenda no one knew what his plans were. Good Lord did we find out. This time I want answers. It should be a lot of fun being a Republican office holder in Michigan these days. They

control the House, they control the Senate and the Nerd who signs their bills is their gov. So they don't need to do a lot of wheeling and dealing, none of that filthy compromise stuff that politicians used to use to get things done. None of that.

Which makes me wonder what kind of shenanigans they have up their sleeves to fix our roads. Over 60% of the voters want something done. The problem is it's all going to cost money, maybe over $1 billion. And then more money to maintain them.

Stick'em up!

So taking into account that Republicans control all the avenues of law-making in the state and the fact that the voters have clearly expressed their interest, what has the GOP done, what laws have they passed, what funding have they jockeyed, what deadlines have they set to deal with the roads? They have all the majorities, they just have to take aim and pull the trigger. So why don't they?

And they don't even like to talk about it. In debates, they hem and haw as if this problem popped up yesterday and they're just clueless what to do.

I don't think that necessarily means that they don't have a plan, however. This legislature and this governor have a history we can look up to learn their voting patterns over the past 4 years. And guess what? If you are a corporation, you are so lucky, because it's the rest us paycheck to paycheck earners are about to take another hit for the team.

That's why ruling GOP they won't talk about it. That's why they could have done something in the

Here's how to fix the roads!

last nine months to address the problem, but they blathered and postured like a 10 year old caught with his hand in the cookie jar. They want us to think like they're waiting for Moses to come down from the mountain with a solution that would let them off the hook. “Hey, don't blame us, Moses did it!”

Now when the Nerd first ran for gov, he said that he wanted structural change in the state's funding. So far that's been a tax shift from businesses to folks like you and me. I guess that's kind of structural, but if he'd said that that's what he intended to do, he'd still be hawking Gateway computers on eBay.

So, this election, his vague references that something needs to be done has me reaching to put my hand over my wallet.

You may know that highway researchers found that each semi-truck damages the roads equivalent to 9,600 cars, but if you think that means that $1 billion is on its way from companies that own big trucks, you haven't been paying attention. Sure, they might get dinged a few cents a gallon but with this administration you and I will get to pick up the rest of the tab.

The road funding in Michigan is a history of one dumb tax shift after another. So when I heard the Nerd talk about “structural change”4 years ago I assumed gas taxes would no longer primarily fund schools, a deal dating back to the Jolly Johnny Engler comedy years. Engler screwed with the tax code so much nobody still knows where any of their state taxes go.

For instance, in November 2001 Jolly John took it upon himself to raid $63 million from

It's not my fault it didn't work.

the Michigan Transportation Fund and dump it into other departments which happened to run afoul of the Michigan Constitution. By January, 79% of Michigan citizens disagreed with Jolly John's thievery, 59% strongly disapproving. (Hmm, a governor that openly violates the constitution and does whatever he pleases regardless of what the people say...sound familiar?)

The chart below tells you all you need to know about why we don't have any money to build and maintain roads. The GOP realized that Jolly Johnny's Proposal A tax reduction took a whole bunch of money away from schools. His solution? Take the 6% sales tax on gasoline and give most of it to the schools. Simple?

Yes he was.

Michigan high taxes, low spending

Michigan, which is considering a major fuel tax hike, already has some of the nation’s highest taxes on fuel, but the lowest spending on roads. This chart compares Michigan’s state gas taxes and road spending with the nation’s highest-tax states and other Midwest states.

State	Taxes on gas (cents)	Dollars spent per lane-mile
California	52.9	43.5
New York	49.9	35.1
Connecticut	49.3	42.5
Hawaii	48.1	48.3
Pennsylvania	41.8	29.3
Michigan	41.4	11.7
Indiana	40.8	13.3
Illinois	39.1	20.5
Wisconsin	32.9	13.9
Ohio	28	18.9
Iowa	22	8.4
NATIONAL AVERAGE	28.2	17.2

Sources: Tax data is for 2014 from the American Petroleum Institute. Spending data is for 2012 from the Federal Highway Administration.

So Nerd, let's talk about structural change, because the gas tax situation sure looks like it needs some fundamental common sense applied to it. Your tendency to consider the middle class and seniors your personal piggy bank must end. 

And since you ran your first campaign without giving us many details about your plans, we'd need to know now how you figure you'll fix this problem if you want our vote.

Hey, the majority in the House and Senate will go along with your leadership if you're a leader.

How about telling them (and us) how you'll fix our roads.

There He Goes Again, Calling Himself a Nerd

I'm getting kind of tired of all Governor Snyder's “Nerd” nonsense. I mean, c'mon. I can proclaim myself a genius but if you believe that there'll just be an idiot in the room with me.

Five years ago when Rick first rebranded himself as a Nerd I had hoped it meant he was creative and had the ability to see problems differently than anyone else, perhaps leading to unconventional solutions. Instead, all we got was a typical Republican governor that lowered or eradicated business taxes to give the rest of us the chance to sacrifice for our state. Not true? How about checking the tax records of Rick Perry (TX), John Kasich (OH), Chris Christie (NJ), Rick Scott (FL), and on and on. Of course those guys don't call themselves Nerds so I give them some credit.

So Rick's been banging his tin drum for a year about fixing the lousy roadways of Michigan. For a mere $1.2 billion dollars a year we can have roads that don't force you to weave around potholes like a gymkhana driver drunk on Red Bull. Snyder claims that the $1.2 billion he wants us to pony up “is not about costing us money; this is about saving us money.” Right. Exactly who is “us” because it sure feels like he's looking at our wallets and as a cost, not a saving.

So the Nerd has a new plan: he wants to punish us. By just doing nothing, he hopes that sooner or later the citizens will just give up and say, “Enough already. Just fix the damn roads and put it on our tab.” I'd sooner ride a horse.

Did you know that it takes 9,600 cars like mine to damage Michigan roads as badly as just one semi-truck. Not your F-150 or Tahoe truck. With all due deference to Hummer owners, I mean BIG vehicles: trucks with GVW painted on the sides. A safe definition might point out that although not all vehicles with commercial license plates are “big trucks”, 99% of the trucks damaging our roads have commercial license plates. Worse, as Michiganders crab about our horrible roads, Michigan allows the highest gross weights on our roads than any other state in the Union. No wonder our roads suck; we ask for it! Even next door to us the Ohio Department of Transportation understands that increasing the load on a single axle by 20% doubles the damage that truck does to our roads.

While Snyder and his cronies are trying to jiggle the fees that you and I pay to operate our vehicle here in the Pothole Wonderland, I must agree that the way we fund our roads and road repair is a byzantine collection of taxes and fees. Part of this nonsense goes back to Gov. Engler's days when futzing with the tax code and Proposal A it was decided to help pay for our schools with a fraction of a gasoline sales tax. Apparently the Nerd has no stomach for “real structural reform” (wasn't that part of his 2010 campaign?) that would take vehicle user taxes and fees and use them for the roads the vehicles drive on. Instead, they're trying to grab an additional $120 annual fee for each vehicle you own, then convince you it's not a tax. Nice try, dudes. 

 

So here's where we could use a Nerd. We need $1.2 billion a year to fix roads damaged, by and large, by commercial trucks owned by the very same companies that got a $1.7 billion per year tax cut from the Gov. And since my fellow citizens and I are currently paying $1.4 billion more in taxes to make up for that cut, I'd say some creative thinking is in order (for a change).

Since I was really good at connect the dots when I was a kid this may appear more obvious to me than it would to a Nerd. I don't know.

The way I see it, a business tax of $1.2 billion per year would still leave corporations with a $500 million tax break and road repair fully funded by the people that ruined them. Seems fair to me.

Have you got a better idea?

Dear One Term: Quit Playing Politics with Potholes!

I'd hoped that my last article about funding road repair in Michigan had exhaustively covered the subject. It was time to move on and discuss other attributes of our current one term governor. Little did I know there was more to the story than I covered and thanks to the additional information from many of you, I offer up more information about our roads, our taxes, and our wallets. Fear not, with one year remaining until One Term's un-coronation, there is sufficient time to examine his record burdening the middle class at length.

As I pointed out a few weeks ago, over 99.9% of the damage done to Michigan roads (state motto: Carry Two Spares) is done by trucks, the ratio being calculated as one semi truck and trailer damaging the roads equivalent to 9,600 passenger cars. I took it a step further and took a trip down Grand River and deduced that most of us don't drive trucks, at least not trucks that weigh in the five figure range. I then further deduced that large heavy trucks must be owned primarily by businesses.
So you might guess which lobbying group jumped on One Term Rick's bandwagon immediately after he proposed fixing the roads primarily by taxing and feeing the very people who don't own the trucks that wrecked our damn roads. If you said the business lobby, you win the prize.
Now I certainly understand why the business lobby thinks they can get One Term to make us pay for their problems: they own him. They convinced him that Michigan is a dung heap and any business looking to move or relocate to Michigan would have selected it by the blindfold-dart-throwing-at-the-map method. So One Term, fresh from the business paradise that is South Dakota (state motto: Where Is Everybody?) decided that most businesses shouldn't pay any taxes at all in the state. He wiped out most corporate taxes, wants to dump the personal property taxes, (and totally screw the towns and villages who depend on personal property tax collection) and now he wants us to fix the roads that his buddies' trucks ruined to attract more truck traffic to our Water/Winter Wonderland.
Now, come to find out, all that money we pay in taxes and fees doesn't even end up in the “fix the roads funds”. An example as to how this occurs can be found in this article from 2001 showing how that master of innovation, Little Johnny Engler, decided that grabbing $63 million from the Michigan Transportation Fund to balance the budget made perfect sense. To wit; “Because state government is now facing a budget deficit, Governor Engler recently issued an executive order which takes $63 million from the Transportation Fund and uses it to fund other non-road related activities,”. Pretty cool, eh?
But of course it wasn't a one time grab. There's actually a bill (senate Bill 6) under consideration that would mandate that some of the funds collected by taxing gasoline and licensing vehicles must be used for transportation related matters. What a concept! “But the 40 percent that's not constitutionally mandated elsewhere should go to transportation.” So if you think you're already paying to maintain the roads, think again because the constitution applies 60% of those monies to other things.
Another ruse is that they will tax the people that can't afford lobbyists schmoozing for their behalf (ie:us) and hope forgetfulness reigns every November in even numbered years. For instance, the tax on diesel fuel hasn't been raised since 1984 according to this 2012 study (page 16). Meanwhile, as of last year, our gas taxes were already fifth highest in the nation.. Lobbyists 1, Citizens 0.
And for some reason that I don't understand, the GOP is afraid of alternate energy and they're considering using this road repair issue as a weapon against these relatively new transportation modes. They see hybrids and electrics as taxable targets because they use little to no gasoline. Never known as the party of the future, they should realize today's young people expect and want to be driving hybrids and electrics in their future according

to this 2012 article and this one from 2013. But hey, the Republicans know their target demographic better than me, I suppose, and conventional energy companies are very generous to elected officials. And if they pull out the “fairness” principle on me (“well, they use the roads just like regular cars”) we're right back to the fact that trucks destroy the roads not cars, gasoline, electric or both.
It bothers me that just as One Term's repeal of most business taxes is kicking in to the tune of around $1.7 billion per year, he's in my face because he needs $1.2 billion to fix the roads. Does anyone else see the irony here?
Sorry, I'm not rich enough to be able to afford One Term's vision for Michigan.

Dear One Term Rick: Fuhgitaboutit!

If Missouri is the “Show Me” state, Michigan must be the “We'll Believe Anything” state. I mean, we actually elected a man as governor who laid out absolutely no specifics on his vision of governing our state. Although he loved to proclaim himself a non-politician, he rolled out every vague platitude and aphorism about “strengthening the state” and “increasing employment” that every first time candidate hopes will satisfy disinterested voters, but in his case they actually did.
And while there are a number of articles to follow about how his unrevealed plans were to strap the poor and middle class with the bill for enacting his vision, for now let's discuss how his new “Fix the Roads” refrain is one more stab at a chance to punish the innocent to pay for his inequitable budget balancing strategy.

It's not that the roads don't need the work. Lord knows that if you drive across this great country you'll notice that Michigan has just about the crappiest roads around. I haven't visited all 50 states and I suppose Alaska may be worse, but for the 28 or so states that I have traversed we're the worst. I definitely agree that the roads need fixing.
But...
My car didn't ruin the roads. Neither did yours. This article claims that it would take 10,000 cars to do the damage one 18 wheeler inflicts on the roads. USA Today believes the correct number is 9,600 cars required to do the same damage, but points out that their assumption is based on the legal weight limit posted for most states at 40 tons. But, as of 2008, over 500,000 trucks with permits allowing them to carry more than 40 tons pounded the nations roads and bridges. If you really want to read an analysis, the University of Kansas did an exhaustive study on a stretch of Kansas highway that concluded the damage from large trucks amounted to roughly $.02 per truck per mile. (see page 122).

So wait a minute. One-term Rick wants me to pick-up the tab? He wants me to pay $1.2 billion to fix roads that I didn't ruin? (By the way, isn't $1.2 billion roughly the amount One Term Rick told businesses they didn't need to pay in taxes henceforth? What a guy, eh?) He wants to raise gas taxes by $.14 per gallon but wait! According to MarketWatch (page 2 of 8) Michigan already has the 7^th highest gas taxes in the country.
It seems pretty clear who busted the roads but One Term Rick prefers groveling to businesses since he'll need a lot more cash this next election when the good citizens of Michigan know exactly what a Tough Nerd means...tough on the middle class.
At this point I'd rather One Term Rick let the roads devolve to gravel than kick in one more cent for his plan to reinvent the State of Michigan on the backs of the poor and middle class. If the people that broke the roads refuse to fix them, don't come asking me for the money.