June 11, 2020 at 3:51 p.m.
The time is now to redevelop economic development
The time is now to redevelop economic development
The Northwoods - and the rural economy in general - cannot afford to be left out of that debate, and candidates for office this fall need to address it.
Even before the lockdowns, life was tough for many in the Northwoods. For example, our poverty rate was one of the highest in the state. While the state's overall poverty rate was 10.8% in the past year, Forest County has had the fourth-highest poverty rate of any Wisconsin county, with 17.5% of its residents earning less than what it takes to live even minimally, while Vilas, Langlade, and Menominee counties all have had at least 14.5% of their residents under the federal poverty line.
Unemployment rates in Oneida, Vilas, Langlade, Lincoln, Marinette, and Menominee counties have all significantly exceeded the state's overall unemployment rate in recent stretches of time.
And even when our hard-working residents have jobs - and there are certainly fewer of them now - their wages have lagged far behind. Average wages in the eight counties of the 12th Senate district, for example, were just $690 per week as of the third quarter of 2018, compared to $1,055 for the state as a whole.
To put it another way, our workers were taking home just 65% of what the average Wisconsin worker took home. That's disgraceful.
The conditions many of our children endure are even more disgraceful. While the child poverty rate for Wisconsin stands at about 18%, it is 25% in Vilas, 24% in Forest, and 23% in Langlade.
Our region's food insecurity rates for children are explosive compared to the state as a whole. While that rate is 10% statewide, food insecurity rates range from 155% to 29% in the eight counties of the 12th Senate district. Even in property rich communities such as the Lakeland area of Oneida and Vilas counties, 40% of students qualified for free or reduced meals at local schools as of 2018.
None of this is our fault. To be sure, demographic and natural factors play a role. As an attractive retirement destination, we attract an aging population that tends to place more pressures on government services. We have difficult winters, to say the least. But these are realities that with vision and effort can be managed. As other places prove, we can provide all the services our elderly need with an efficient use of government resources and a laser-like focus on core government functions.
As for winter, it has its rewards on the tourism side, while proper infrastructure can mitigate the problems the weather poses for manufacturing and transportation. The truth is, such things as the weather and aging are minor compared to the real problem facing northern Wisconsin.
That problem is state government.
Yes, we know, liberals will respond to poverty statistics and the lockdown economy with calls for ever more government handouts and ever more government action, and they will do so especially in the post-lockdown economy, even though it was Democrats who created that economy.
But truth be told, government action - specifically, government handouts to corporations and special interests in the southern part of the state - is what has held northern Wisconsin down when it comes to economic development.
Make no mistake, when the government greases the skids for downstate special interests, as it has for decades, it is like super glue on the soles of our economic shoes.
Not to say that northern Wisconsin needs a handout. We don't. What we need is for state government to stop unfair subsidies down south. What government really needs to do is get out of the way and let northern Wisconsin be northern Wisconsin.
A recent report on rural depopulation suggested that there's only so much state officials can do to stop rural economic decline, ensuring a diverse industry mix and providing access to high-speed internet among them.
We believe state government can do more, but first it should undo many of the past grievances that has helped cause depopulation in the first place.
Give us a fair playing field, and northern Wisconsin will compete. Unleash our fierce culture of independence and entrepreneurship, and northern Wisconsin will thrive. Let us embrace our liberty and our way of life, and northern Wisconsin will not just shine but lead the way.
The very first rule of government should be to do no harm. But over the decades, our state government has done much harm, and the first call to action is to undo the damage. For example, even though we have large swaths of government-owned land that leaves less land for economic development, the government continues to seek more government-owned or controlled land, mostly in our region, where it already owns 20% of the land.
The government also transfers wealth to the southern part of the state from our region through taxation, taking more in fuel and other taxes than the government returns.
Way back when, the Democratic Jim Doyle administration adopted an industrial policy that assigned growth to every part of the state but the North. We were told to be happy with tourism. Well, tourism is great, but, as the recent report shows, without a diversified year-round economy that builds population, jobs, and wages, there's no work force or infrastructure to sustain it.
Doyle also sealed our fate with rail policies that have robbed us of critical transportation infrastructure, and he embraced aggressive and overly restrictive comprehensive land-use planning policies that were designed to make northern economic development all but impossible.
Republican Scott Walker was so much better for the state as a whole, but he too failed the North with his aggressive policy of funneling billions of targeted subsidy dollars into developments in southern Wisconsin, sucking any real life out of northern economic development hopes.
Foxconn was the biggest insult, a $3.6-billion handout to an international Goliath for a project that is already at least part boondoggle. That was $3.6 billion that, instead of going to a corporate special interest, could have been used to cut taxes statewide - including the fuel tax, which severely punishes our region - to enable every region of the state to be competitive and attractive.
Democrat Tony Evers hasn't changed the industrial policy, either, and his first budget robbed northern residents of even more, denying us a needed regional mental health crisis center, stacking his economic development policy council with Madison and Milwaukee insiders, and axing money earmarked for worker training in the northern portion of the state.
Now along comes the aftermath of Mr. Evers's lockdown, and we must be wary of the proposals that will come forward. Likely as not, major new subsidies will be proposed, and they will be heavily tilted toward Democratic strongholds in Madison and Milwaukee.
We think that flat Earth thinking needs to be rejected, and rejected forcefully. We need to rethink economic development completely, and in a way that provides a level playing field for all, rather than merely increasing our region's competitive economic disadvantage .
Such an agenda will not just be serious about cutting taxes but also about reducing the size and scope and spending of government. Such an agenda will move government out of the business of picking winners and losers in the economy, and giving every citizen and every region a level playing field on which to compete.
Such an agenda will promise to fully fund the services our elderly and poorer residents and children need and deserve, from child care to health care to assistance for the elderly at home and in transition, and doing so by cutting the needless billions of dollars this government spends on big corporations and elite special interests, mostly in Madison and Milwaukee.
By sticking to the core functions of government, we can fully fund those services while cutting government overall.
In a post-lockdown economy, it's an agenda whose time is now, or it could never be. It can triumph, but only if northern Wisconsin residents stand up and promote it and demand it.
The time is now to redevelop economic development.
Comments:
You must login to comment.