Jonathan Smith on LinkedIn: I get to work on a lot of cool stuff in my role at Michigan Department of… (2024)

The work is far from over but excited to celebrate all that has been accomplished so far! Josh Sirefman Carolina Pluszczynski Mark de la Vergne Clarinda Barnett-Harrison Luke Polcyn Hassan Beydoun Emma Jabour Dana L. Williams Terri Weems Susan Corbin Justine Johnson Trevor Pawl Spencer Lucker Liz Keen Garrett Winther

48

1 Comment

I appreciate the sentiment, but the data is clear: Michigan does a great job retaining its college graduates (thanks to Glenn Stevens and Richard Florida for their work debunking this myth). The reason we have a talent gap is because we are not attracting young people from other states. We are 7th in the country on college graduate retention and 49th in population growth. Young people aren't moving to cities like Miami, Denver and Seattle because they are low cost, low amenity communities. Young people are moving to cities that are investing in transit, housing, and placemaking businesses. Michigan needs to make similar investments in growing, vibrant communities if it wants to attract more people. https://lnkd.in/eNDiB4DW

92

10 Comments

I survived another Mackinac Policy Conference! Four days of stimulating conversations, inspiring speakers, new connections, old friends, late nights, early mornings and special Mackinac moments. I was thrilled to see Governor Whitmer highlight innovation in her keynote speech this year, continuing to push forward the effort to increase support for entrepreneurs and high-growth companies. Especially excited to have Ben Marchionna as a new partner in state government to support all the amazing founders, funders and ecosystem partners who make this such a special place to live and work. #MPC2024

92

3 Comments

Congratulations to Phil Roos, Cory Connolly, Kara Cook, Julia Field, Maggie Jean K. and the entire team at the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy for organizing the MI Healthy Climate Conference. It was inspiring to hear from so many climate and energy leaders. A huge thank you to Carla Walker-Miller, Ann Wilson, Justin Pommerville from U.A. Local 85 and Michael Bosanac from Monroe County for being part of a panel discussion about the Community & Worker Economic Transition Office. Huge shoutout to Kate Bell for all her help with panel prep and logistics and Chad Oberdoerster and Trevor Pawl for the stellar photos!

79

5 Comments

This was a great conversation! So glad to have such strong partnership with Maureen Donohue Krauss, FM, Christine Roeder and the whole Global Epicenter of Mobility (GEM) team! And very lucky to have the one and only Trevor Pawl as an advisor to the Community & Worker Econmic Transition Office.

21

I've got an amazing panel lined up to talk about the Community & Worker Economic Transition Office at the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy MI Healthy Climate Conference next week. It's not too late to register!

24

1 Comment

It was an exciting day in Detroit! We welcomed Vice President Harris, Sec. Granholm, Acting Sec. Su and a host of amazing staff to Michigan where they announced a number of important actions the Biden-Harris Adminstration is taking to support our state’s auto industry and workers. https://lnkd.in/eeeAXh-PAlex Jacquez Anna Duffy Alejandro Perez Vanessa Grisko Teresa Acuña Andy Flick Tracy Winston Jennifer Llewellyn Portia Roberson Chong-Anna Canfora Greg Pitoniak Dana L. Williams Ryan Hundt Christine Roeder Zachary Kolodin Stephanie Beckhorn Drew Coleman, EDFP, MBA Maureen Donohue Krauss, FM Carla Walker-Miller Natalie King Jacob Maas Andre Crook Jim Sawyer Jerry Ruskowski Scott Powell Ned Staebler

111

This opinion piece is completely and totally wrong. There are many things we could do to encourage more Michiganders to work, but keeping unemployment benefits low isn't one of them. First, in order to receive unemployment benefits you have to be actively looking for work. If you stop looking for work or if your work search takes too long, you stop getting benefits. It's that simple. Second, companies aren't struggling to fill openings because of the unemployment rate. Both here in Michigan and nationally the unemployment rate is hovering at around 4%, which is very low by historic standards. The reason it's hard to find workers is because too many of them have stopped looking for work. Workforce participation peaked in 2000 then entered a long period of decline. Since the COVID pandemic, Michigan has had the fastest growing workforce of any Midwest state. Our workforce participation rate is now greater than it was at the end of 2019, but it's still 6.5% lower than it was a quarter century ago. Getting back to 2001 levels of workforce participation would add more than 300,000 workers to the state's economy. So why aren't these folks working? Probably because they can't afford to. According to Michigan Future, Inc., in 2001 more than 40% of Michigan manufacturing jobs offered middle class wages but that number has dropped by nearly half and now just 22% of workers in production roles qualify as middle class. If wages don't cover the cost of childcare, reliable transportation, and health care premiums how is someone supposed to work? If you really want to get more workers into the economy, you should be fighting for better wages and to provide greater access to low-cost childcare and public transportation. Finally, Michigan already has lower benefits than most states, including neighboring states like Ohio and Indiana. Michigan's maximum benefit is set at 30% of the state's average wage, or about $350 a week. Neighboring states provide 40-50% of their state's average wage, and around the country some states actually provide as much as 70% in wage replacement. You'll notice the author doesn't cite any proof of a connection between more generous benefits and higher unemployment rates and that's because there isn't one. Despite having some of the lowest benefits in the country, Michigan's unemployment rate is in line with the national average. And those states with the highest benefits? They have low unemployment rates, too. If you're not convinced just ask yourself this - if you lost your job and were getting just enough money to cover the weekly groceries and a tank of gas would another $100 each week really be the reason you didn't go back to work? https://lnkd.in/eSN_h52t

52

3 Comments