Proposal 1 Comment Of The Day

Well, yesterday’s, as I just noticed today but, it is noteworthy: Click here.

You see, once one moves past what I call Chuck’s cutesy outhouse-genius mentality of telling wondering tales, it all comes down to the $116,000,000.00 baked into Proposal 1 that Chuck & Co. would like to get their hands on for Rick Snyder’s perpetual Detroit bailout and his Utopian moving of chattel schemes.

einstein_simpleThere are many viable Plan B options in the works, and we all know that. The end.

Ps. we all should thank our lucky stars for term limits. Moving to a part time legislature is way past its needing, too.

Pps. does one wonder why Chuck is so sensitive about protecting the insurance lobby sitting on $18 Billion without ever opening up their books for audit?
GasTaxRegistrationFreesHike
Just sayin’…

You Betcha! (22)Nuh Uh.(0)

February Michigan Unemployment 5.9% – Really?

Philadelphia Fed Website 2015-04-06

Kurt Weiss at the Michigan Department of Technology, Management, and Budget (DTMB) reported on March 25th that Michigan’s February 2015 seasonally adjusted unemployment rate dropped to 5.9% from January’s 6.3% figure. This was followed on April 2nd by the DTMB release of non seasonal adjusted employment data for February 2015. This quite large one month drop is great news for Michigan workers, if it indeed reflects our labor market. But does it?

Twelve Month Discrepancies Between Seasonally Adjusted and Unadjusted Data Differentials

The DTMB Michigan non seasonally adjusted (NSA) employment report for February 2015, at the bottom of page 6, showed that Michigan’s civilian labor force declined by 33,000 workers over the twelve preceding months. But the seasonally adjusted (SA) employment report for February 2015 at the top of page 2 showed that Michigan’s civilian labor force increased by 7,000 workers over the same twelve months. The growth of Michiganders employed over the same twelve month period also shows a 5,000 worker NSA/SA discrepancy: 101,000 not seasonally adjusted versus 96,000 seasonally adjusted. And the shrinkage of Michigan’s unemployed worker population over the same twelve month period shows a 46,000 worker NSA/SA discrepancy: 134,000 not seasonally adjusted versus 88,000 seasonally adjusted.

Valid seasonal corrections should produce twelve month differentials which agree with comparable item non seasonally adjusted differentials over the same twelve month period. Here we have a 0.85% discrepancy in Michigan’s total civilian labor force, a 0.1% discrepancy in civilian employment over the same twelve month period, and a 12.5% discrepancy in the shrinkage of Michigan’s unemployed worker population over the same twelve month period.

How did this happen?

The DTMB turns its employment data over to the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics for X-13ARIMA-SEAT seasonal adjustment. BLS also adjusts underlying data periodically for changes in the Michigan population estimates of the U.S. Census. The two (SA and NSA) February 2015 DTMB employment reports both reflect substantial BLS revisions undertaken in early 2015. A note at the top of page 2 in the DTMB February 2015 SA employment report:

Note: The data in this release reflects recently revised historical estimates. Seasonally adjusted labor force estimates for 1976-2014 for Michigan and 1990-2014 for the Detroit-Warren-Dearborn MSA were revised. Previous published data should be replaced with this new series. In addition, seasonally adjusted payroll job data was revised for 2010-2014. For newly revised data, please contact DTMB at 313-456-3090.

The DTMB February 2015 NSA employment report bears a similar note on its first page noting that it was also subjected to substantial revisions.

So Michigan’s employment data has been subjected to substantial revisions at BLS which produce seasonal adjustments that do not cross check against comparable item non seasonally adjusted data over the most recent 12 month period.

You Betcha! (16)Nuh Uh.(0)

Kurdys On Common Core In Traverse City

There is more of a problem with common core than bizarre math.

Melanie Kurdys is probably the foremost expert on the common core curriculum in Michigan.  She has logged hundreds of hours speaking on the topic and making folks aware of the ruination of our educational system.

In this video Melanie speaks to the Traverse Bay 912 group at one of it’s weekly meetings.

Enjoy.

You Betcha! (12)Nuh Uh.(0)

Life at “inception”

Get a load of this smear job (No, I’m not giving links to Finley for any advertising hits).

Inception_N_Finkleyclick on image to enlarge

So, basically, slimy nincompoop Nolan wants an amoral society of worker-bees funding a big bifarceisan government or, debt slaves. Well, the bald bastard has just that in the Snyder/Calley administration. It sucks only in other fashion from the prior big spenders.

Nevertheless, there is the ugly truth about what the MI-GOP has become. For those who will be voting next month, when you look around the room at everybody, and you don’t see who “the mark” is – it is you. Tho, I’m rather confident the Party apparatchik will double-down on stupid.

History proves it has again and again!

You Betcha! (13)Nuh Uh.(2)

Getting The Message Out

STOP-167Scales reminds us yesterday that all it takes is 50% +1 to “entrench this mess into our constitution.”

Even the polling a month out that shows the crushing defeat of this boondoggle, but we need to be aware that it probably ought not be trusted.  People are fickle, and the herds of Michigan voters are carefully being prodded along using every tool in the toolbox.

On this site there are no fewer than 70 articles directly or otherwise related to proposal 15-1.  Each of them highlighting a failure of leadership, misuse,  or misrepresentation of resources and fact with regard to the stewardship of our transportation dollars.  We are doing our part to make folks aware that all-is-not-as-it-seems in our state capitol.

But our readership is not the entire population of the state.  (even though it should be)

You Betcha! (18)Nuh Uh.(0)

Rep. Franz Explains the Disaster That is Proposal 1

Wait until you discover zero sales tax dollars goes to roads, and the Education Fund doesn’t mean money going to schools. Enjoy.

Think those additional costs on shipping goods to stores aren’t going to be passed along to you on top of the direct personal hit to the wallet? Better think again about that.

Thanks for voting against this convoluted, Snyder invented perpetual tax hike during the lame duck, Rep. Franz. Also, thanks for being the only Rep. to address this, and the fact there are multiple “Plan B’s” in the works.

STOP-167And, to you out there who are appalled that Lansing had the audacity to foist this abomination onto us, you better get off your asses and Vote NO on May 5, because the news outlet editorial page propagandists pushing Snyder’s agenda is already ramping up their “it’s all we got” meme as noted here and here.

Remember, requirement is 50% + 1 stinking vote is all it takes to entrench this mess into our constitution.

You Betcha! (48)Nuh Uh.(0)