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A new report sponsored by local business associations shows income for Portland residents is lagging behind other cities in the western states. The report was timed to come out in the same week as the Oregon Business Summit, where business and political leaders discussed plans to raise per capita incomes statewide above the national average by 2020.
The Oregon Business Plan provided the main fodder for discussion at the summit. Since 2002, this almost annual report has laid out a framework for business associations to coordinate their longterm visions, but this year's plan sounds more urgent than those in the past. It starts with the bold sentence, "Oregon stands at an economic crossroads," and goes on to say that the state economy is in a downward spiral that "threatens the quality of life that we cherish in Oregon." The plan hammers home the connection between private sector jobs and public services, like education, in a state that's heavily dependent on income taxes.
Did you move here from another state where your income was different? How does your salary compare to people in your industry who live elsewhere? Is there something about living in Oregon that makes up for a lower salary?
GUESTS:
- Sandra McDonough: President and CEO of the Portland Business Alliance
- John Tapogna: President of ECONorthwest
- Arnie Roblan: Oregon state representative representing district 9 and designated Democratic Speaker of the Oregon House for the 2011 legislative session
- Bruce Hanna: Oregon state representative representing district 7 and designated Republican Speaker of the Oregon House for the 2011 legislative session
- Duncan Wyse: President of the Oregon Business Council
Tagged as: budget · business · economy · jobs
Photo credit: Amy Messere / Creative Commons
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Hi, My opinion for the low wages and the work mentality, here in Oregonis because of the undocumented workers. I am in the construction fieldand I have to pay license, workmans comp insurance, taxes, and theydo not have to pay anything. I spend all of the money I earn here, andthey send theirs to relatives in Mexico. I, also, am out of work and havebeen looking for work for 3 years. I go to a site and, all of the constructionhelp, everyone there, is illegal. This is your number one problem, here in Portland, and by theway good work is not cheap and cheap work is not good. M.W.
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Just yesterday the legislature heard a report by our state's employment division analysts dealing with this issue. I hope you will explore what they have to say in "Why Oregon Trails the Nation: an analysis of personal income." Essentially it says that there are two major contributors to the decline of Oregon's per capita income relative to the national average: (1) too many people keep moving here and (2) Oregonians are willing to work for less than those in other parts of the country who get paid for doing the same work, which is likely a result of the fact that those extra folks want to be employed here in Oregon. Our growth in population is much higher than most states.
These are not the issues raised by the business community. According to the number crunchers, it woiuld take 140 businesses each hiring 1000 employees and paying every one of them $100,000 to bring Oregon's per capita income up to the national average.
It's important to look at the facts, not just believe the urban myths on this issue.
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Yeah Oregonians are willing to work for less because they are SO DESPERATE for jobs that they don't have any choice.
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@sunvalleysally - I'd posit that the reason folks are so desperate is because our state does a pretty darn good job of chasing money-making companies out of our state.
I've watched a number of my own entrepreneurial friends leave this state because of the high costs of operating here. It's much cheaper going up north by one state. Columbia also thought so when they moved out of Multinomah county.
I myself have considered it more and more recently after watching our own Portland city government passing $100's of millions of dollars of infrastructure money (sewer taxes) to bike lanes. Bikes are great, but they don't create any high-paying jobs; nor do they kept the infrastructure I need for a business going.
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@ aloevera;
please don't exaggerate so grossly rumors you have heard and accepted as truth for your own purposes. I know it's tempting, but try thinking it out
$100's of millions on bike lanes???
ummm... 'think it out' is the only response i have to that.
What purpose does it serve to pass along lies? Do you feel more informed for knowing something which, if you gave it a bit of more careful thought, would disprove itself?
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@lolo - I'm 100% NOT exaggerating nor lying. I pay very close attention to local politics and bills. The bike plan passed THIS YEAR by Mayor Adams is summed up by the following:
"The 20 year plan, which aims to increase ridership in Portland to 25% of all trips by bicycle in the year 2030, has an estimated price tag of around $600 million, for about 600 miles of bicycle boulevards, separated paths, and trails."
This is all public record if you'd like to look it up - it made a number of local papers. $600 million dollars does qualify as $100's of millions of dollars I believe - and I'm just as blown away at the number as you.
I would encourage you to pay attention to the various things the current city government is doing - and you'll find this isn't the only gross mis-spending of your tax dollars the local city government is involved in. Trust me, investigate even a little into how much they allocate for their pet projects and how little they invest in real efforts that citizens need (like jobs, education, and crumbling infrastructure) and how poorly the programs they did fund perform (e.g. commissioning and ignoring $100,000+ reports/etc) and you'll be hopping mad like the rest of us that pay attention to our local government's graft and waste.
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I think sunvalley sally has identified the simtom Alovera the cause of the symptom. now what is the cure? I dont know.
The only thing I know is I think we all have to come back to reallity and realise that untill we are economically stable and prosperouse we may have to for get all the little pet projects we would like to see and the pet peaves we have and get on to reall solutions.
Bike lanes remodeling ofices and whatever else isnt really important when people dont have work and I mean work not food stamps and unemployment. When people work hard they take pride in things and we have a lot to be proud of I think in the Northwest but we need to get back to our roots and work for those things and use the resources we have while being responcible with what those resourses provide.
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dear aloevera - thanks for thinking, and while i am fairly sure you may have some figures, yet haven't figured out what they mean, so you've panicked instead.
the only thing i suspect we might agree upon is that everything costs way more than it ought - and that we all still get paid way less than we should, and things still don't work out, and so we drink and go buy silly expensive sweaters to help the economy.
This is the sense of things that i get from listening to folks.
Not much there, eh?
for example, they think the new Sellwood bridge is going to cost how much? and for an ugly and unimaginative replacement?
We're not even going to make it to the bathroom, let alone the moon again.
that bridge will fall first, rather than Clackamas co. residents should pay $5 a year for a few years - this is the kind of boneheadedness which holds us back - not the amount of money, but the lack of brains behind the money
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This report is misleading. Using per capita personal income as the sole measure of economic vitality excludes people who reside in other states but work in Oregon (I'm thinking of Vancouver, WA, specifically)--even though they pay Oregon income taxes and tend to make their purchases here as well. Since the metro area largely drives per capita income, this has a significant effect on the statewide statistics.
Another interesting omission from this report is that while the per capita income of Portland residents is about 10% below the national average for metro areas, our rural areas are actually doing quite well--within 3% of the national average.
That's not to mention that we have seen consistently higher population growth than the national average, reducing per capita income. Other states with comparable population growth have fared similarly. If you look at the states that have increased their per capita income in recent history, none of them have experienced anything even close to our population growth, making the national average an unfair comparison. We simply aren't New York or Connecticut.
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If this and the last post are correct, that migration fueled population growth is resulting in too many people chasing too few jobs, then it seems that we either need to drive significant job growth (I'm stuck here) or we make Oregon a less desireable place to migrate (I'm remembering the McCall years)... which it will become by default if unsupported migration continues.
Can your guests supply concrete proposals as to how job growth might be significantly enhanced or alternately how we might discourage migration?
I'd also like to know if this is a long-term trend and if there is a correlation between the effective end of the timber industry in Oregon and the overall decline in wages (e.g., was there a big dip from which we haven't recovered).
<TIC> Perhaps if we all adopted a "New York attitude" while driving/interacting... or focused media attention on how rampant "mad-slug disease" has become... other ideas?
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Jacob - Washington pays nearly that in sales taxes though not on food. But there is also a sales tax on services. However in the great scheme of things you are more than half right because Oregon has a very abusive income tax both in the percentage of income it attacks and the various ways it is calculated vis a vis federal tax.
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You can get around sales taxes... shop online at sites based out of state.
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Rethomas
"shop online".
But don't the shipping charges completely overwhelm any savings from taxes?
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Good point Tom... you have to get creative... take advantage of free shipping offers, etc. Things aren't always cheaper online either, especially if you have discount coupons to local stores.
Over the years I convinced myself that the amount of time I spent to find something online (my time plus connection) + the cost of the product + the shipping cost was generally less than the cost of shopping (my time) + gas + wear/tear on the car + cost of product + sales tax.
I will say that since I moved back to Oregon, I've spent much less time shopping online... exception is Christmas with the concommitant crowds/traffic. :-)
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rethomas
Well you have good points about how it all adds up.
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Income and availability of jobs are both much lower here than in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Oregon has a severe problem with the underground economy. Both undocumented workers; and also people working under the table to lower their cost to employers or clients, avoid child support payments or to avoid other legal judgements against them that involve the garnishment of wages.
Because thse groups of people are forced by percieved circumstance to take lower wages, they depress the economy as a whole. Both because they make less money themselves and because their employment drives down the going rate for their labor input in our local market.
Because taxes often go uncollected the state budget suffers. Because workmen's compensation is not paid, injured workers show up in emergency rooms; and in the end the public at large pays for their treatment through increased insurance premiums. For business that provide health insurance it is a further burden to support their competitors. Employees end up paying because increased payments by their employers for insurance cuts into the profit that pays wages.
It is the employers however that should be held responsible because they stand to benefit the most by breaking the law and profiting from the labor of those working for them illegally. Contracts are landed by them because they have a much lower labor cost and drive other legal businesses out of business through competition in the marketplace.
In addition, much of the money earned by illegal workers leaves the teacup of our economy and supports economies elsewhere; lowering social pressure in those countries to undergo substantial political change, and thus reinforcing the extreme disparities of income in those countries; pressures which would be much more likely to come to the fore if people in those countries continued to grovel for wages within their own countries.
The arguement that some certain nationalities work so much harder than the typical American are baseless. Most of the increased productivity of these groups falls squarely on operating outside a basic envelope of safety. But once again, because workmen's comp is not involved the accidents are not tied to particular employers and the system does not record the cost. Undocumented workers also are routinely denied overtime, which again cuts tax rates in that group and depresses state government revenue.
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Continued...
Our main tool for the discovery of undocumented workers is the not-yet-mandatory use, by employers, of the E-Verify system. But even when this system is utilized it is still an easy work-around for the undocumented worker. The system only requires a match of a social security number and a name on a photo ID. There have been many arrests in the parking lots of Malls and Big Box Stores of people providing these matching documents utilizing advanced color printing equipment in vans. No one it seems is trying to figure out why some Social Security accounts are receiving multiple payments from across the country and nothing seems to be taking place at the state level.
The process whereby employers circumvent this whole system employing people for cash is going to be much more difficult to discover but one key would be through a system whereby the state CCB would require construction sites to list the CCB numbers of participating contractors in bold print at the front of a job site. It would be a simple effort thereafter to see if exempt contractors indeed were working with several employees. Exempt employers could be hiring through a temp agency but if a team of workers is constantly working on this basis, they really are a single entity and should be required to act like one, and pay workmen's comp rates for the work they are doing and not some general temp agency rate.
The State also loses when contractors hire through temp agencies because the temp agencies utilize a single CCB number throughout the state and so the state does not collect fees from each branch even though each brance is acting as a single entitiy.
In the end people have to stand up for themselves and their families; and that gets uncomfortable in our laid back social scene. Perhaps as more prisons are closed and more old folks are going without the support of the safety net and more businesses are closing up because they cannot compete; our own social responsibility will come to the fore. Perhaps.
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In a mid-size Oregon (Willamette Valley) town I earn only 70 percent of what I made working in a Seattle suburb in 1992. That is not a typo. 1992. Eighteen years ago and I now earn only 70 percent (actually a little less than 70 percent) of what I earned doing the same job in Seattle. The only difference is that I am far better qualified and knowledgeable now than I was then - not that that is rewarded in the Oregon economy. Furthermore in my "avocation" I was charging $35 for a 3/4 hour horseback riding lesson (saddleseat and sidesaddle in coaching riders for breed-specific competition at the regional and national level) and had a waiting list of students. But when I moved to the Willamette Valley in 1993 having purchased an equestrian facility here, I found the locals hollered bloody murder at having to pay even $10 an hour and there was a pernicious "cowboy mentality" in equestrian pursuits here until about ten years ago when the equestrian community outside of Portland finally started to gain momentum. IMO, generally there seems to be a sort of "poverty mentality" in Western Oregon, at least, and especially the middle to south Willamette Valley, that permeates so much of the population here; it is hard to describe well, but to me it combines an unearned arrogance about the supposed superiority of being an Oregon resident with an assumption of a holier-than-thou "doing without for the privilege of living here" attitude. I do use the word "unearned" with specific reference to Oregonians think they are SO "green" but as recently as five years ago three Oregon rivers made it to the Superfund cleanup list; I also use the word "unearned" because Oregonians think they are SO "forward thinking" yet the Oregon employment laws and regulations are so out of date as to more properly be labeled BACKWARDS.
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i find myself in much agreement - Oregon, the land, is a beautiful place - Oregon, the people are a lot who have seen way too little of the bigger world and think way too much of their own little stretch of paradise, and by the way, there's an unauthorized dump near everything because of these same folks - but they do the 'blame Cali' dance if you mention this.
The wage laws/tax laws/most laws were put in place by the robber barons and their progeny - wake up! most of you aren't even related to those has-beens who left with the money, and left the mess.
To the rest of the world, this is just another under-populated backwater, and no amount of coffee shops or punk bands or bringing back the lumberjack is going to change that. what is most lacking is Civilization among the population. Money helps, but is not necessary. But it helps. The product of better education will do more.
Also, some should have their great-grandparents sent back to the old country because, um, well, there was no documentation, and so ‘you’ are just the descendent of illegals.
That might kinda make you illegal, eh? does that make your day?
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Two More Places...
There are two other places where money is running out of our local economy like gin through a sieve. Forestry and Fishing.
Say whatever you like about the current diversification of our economy with all of the shiny white silicon forest campuses, but the real forest in Oregon is made of Douglas Fir and Hemlock trees, Ponderosas and Cedars, and all of their foliage and fungus kin; knit into one of the grandest ecosystems on the face of the planet.
And swimming within that ecosystem, year after year, day after day, cool pool and rapid, one after the other, again and again, is the most advanced scientific monitoring device ever conceived: The Pacific Salmonid. Restore a vital ecosystem with its native plants and vegetation, preserve its cool waters with shade, allow the floods to wash the siltation off of the gravel, cut the phosphates and take out the old tires and garbage; like the canyon behind Reed Campus in Portland, and watch the magic of returning Salmonids declare the success as they make the final half mile of the journey to the canyon through a remodeled culvert and someone's side yard ditch. It had probably been 20 years.
And yet, despite being the very extraction point for valuable forest and fish resources, in demand throughout the workd and its finest sushi restraurants, we seldom see the value added that we could see.
Lumber is so cheap and available that thousands of board feet of this resource is sitting this very moment in dumpsters throughout the state on its way to a chipper to become hog fuel or compost. This while the inhabitants of the city flock to IKEA and buy cheap furniture made of particle board in a foreign place because there can apparently be no homespun furniture industry in a land covered wall to wall with trees. So many trees that when the first Timber Barons arrrived, they saw so many they assumed they would never be able to cut them all down. With all of this scrap why would anone anywhere in the country ever cut a standard window cripple stud again, or fascia block. Why aren't we manufacturing standard door and window headers? Why are all the bee hive parts coming from somewhere else?
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"Why aren't we manufacturing standard door and window headers? Why are all the bee hive parts coming from somewhere else?"
Because they can build them cheaper than we can...
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Cheaper than we can...
Cheaper than we can is often only calculated at the price tag level. You need to factor in externalities to determine the true cost of something and that is a complicated affair.
But just one example would be the export of our production of consumer goods to China. Yes the goods are cheaper but they are completing a new coal fired power plant every 10 days and the pollution, as in acid rain, falls in North America and most of that west of the Cascades, and in fact a good deal of that right here in Portland.
Externalities figure into a large component of economics but they are too complicated for most people to take the time to understand. It is easier for most people to listen to sound bites on television commercials and form their opinions at the end of an advertisers carrot string.
If externalities were understood by a majority; and people took them into account when they made purchasing decisions, many things like organic farming and sustainable logging and such like would automatically fall into a favorable stasis.
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77... You are right of course... but the only metric I see when I shop is the price tag. Even if we invented a labeling system highlighting the externalities... after it had been scrubbed by bureaucrats, legislators, the WTO, the G20 and countless courts... the majority wouldn't read them as they are motivated by their pocketbook.
Tariffs to compensate for the environmental impact of another country is a possibility iff they don't spark a trade-war or cut off vital resources (ex: China is a key world exporter of rare earths vital to a technological society).
Enlightenment of the populace (foreign, US or both)... most are too busy just trying to survive to engage in environmental idealism even though they might like to (personal observation/generalization). I suppose we could always take a page out of the religious playbook and establish a "Church of the Earth", send out missionaries and convert the natives.
Force... because American lives are being endangered by the detritus of a foreign power... let's see how Iraq and AfPak works out first.
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Seven7, I think you're raising a lot of very important points. Thank you!
I also think OPB should embrace the understanding that economic development is everyone's issue, not just a business lobby issue. The discussion panel today seems to represent only a very narrow range out of the broad spectrum of important voices on this issue.
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Rethomas
Church of the Earth, I like that. A church that deals in reality, instead of the supernatural. Yes!
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cont...
And our Salmon, our precious Salmon.
On the east coast of the United States there is no longer anywhere to catch and retain an Atlantic Salmon. "The Leaper" arguably the fightingest fish ever, is commercially and recreationally extinct. The state of Maine is glad to see a few thousand while we lament the fact when we get less than 3 million of our historical run of 20 million. And when we do get salmon we pursue them in the river with nets and sell them, like our forest, with no value added. One transaction and the fish is gone over the border, out of the region and critically, unavailable to the possible tourist that we might entice to come here from the fishless east coast. We make a couple of hundred for one frozen fish and miss the airport fee, hotel room, fishing license, rental car, guide fee, tackle purchase, and the price of ten meals out over the course of a few days.
We trade a couple of hundred dollars for a couple of thousand dollars we will never see.
If we just cannot see our way to eliminating gill nets in our rivers let us at least finally draw the line in the whitecap; and say that no matter how good the fishing gets, no fisherman will ever get to keep more than s/he has kept in his/her best year. And when He or She, the holder of that precious salmon gill net permit, can no longer drive the boat; That permit is over. And to encourage the thing along, we could grant these same fishermen and fisherwomen free recreational fishing licenses, along their bloodlines for the next 7 generations to turn over their permits tomorrow.
Oregon is the Pacific Wonderland. While a lot of the world lies in environmental ruins; (no Atlantic Salmon in France or Germany either; rivers running through Korea, India, etc. brown with toxic waste, millions of square miles of minefields and brownfields; air in Bejing so bad it cannot be quantified ) we got lucky and got the hippies and the Governor that made all of the difference in the race so far.
We should take advantage of that.
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Take away their fishing permit and give them free recreational fishing licenses? Really? That's the answer?
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The problem with the economy is that people are working for almost half of what they made just a few years ago. My husband, the only wage earner in our family of 4, is in carpentry. He has extensive experience and just 2 years ago was earning $35 and hour. Now he is earning $16 and hour to do the same job which included being a supervisor. He has to work side jobs on the weekends just to make ends meet and that is on top of a 45-55 hour work week at his day job. It is an employers market and they know that people are desperate for money to keep surviving when we should be "thriving", so they keep paying low wages because they can. My career is in social work with disadvantaged teens and was laid off due to budget cuts a few years ago. There is no safe place these days that will provide your family with what they need with any security.
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is actually decreased a lot, that's a shame, and the worst is that the accounts onlyincrease
massagem tailandesa ns
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I left my last job in 2007 when a new owner bought the business. He told me, "I love your work, you're really important to this company, but I'm not going to pay you what you're currently earning." He offered me a 38% pay cut and I said, "No thank you," and quit. I had managed the store for five years and I was the second highest producing salesperson selling over a million dollars in inventory over seven years. This particular business survives and thrives on discretionary customer income.
In 1999 I easily earned twice as much as I did as a salesman in 2007 but good information technology jobs were declining well before the dot com bust in 2001.
I've considered that Oregonians don't want to pay ANY taxes. They want goods and services for free. They rush to Walmart and spend dollars that go to companies which shield their profits from U.S. taxes. Oregonians are loathe to appreciate the true cost of goods and services and are rightfully angry that so many businesses charge too much for too little service.
Why does repairing the rear bumper on my newer car cost $5,600? $1,500 was labor and the rest parts and materials.
Meanwhile the cost of living has increased. $3/gallon gas. The ridiculous increase in housing is astounding. I know someone who bought their house for $40,000 20 years ago. They just sold it for $380,000. 850% increase in 20 years? Congratulations to my neighbor for their shrewd deal.
Tax cuts for the rich have not created new jobs so we can end that sound bite permanently.
Frankly, my campaign to get everybody I know to quit their jobs has been a good tilt at wind mills slowly spinning in the Columbia Gorge. I can't figure any other effective way to starve governments and corporations of my dollars so I can get their attention. I can't get them to change with letter writing or physical protests.
I suggest a nationwide and semi permanent strike until feasible changes to our systems are implemented.
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I took a 8K pay cut to move from Phoenix to here for cost of living. Trash, Elec., gas, cable, and water were ALL more expensive here, not to mention housing was at least 1/2 more expensive. We didn't realize how much utilities were until we got here. I can make the same amount of money here in my college educated profession as I can in Kansas! Homes in Kansas cost half as much as they do here. In the 90's homes were more expensive in the KC Metro than they were here. Wages have not kept up with the cost of living here. My company gauges their wages in the Portland metro by surveying the likes of small towns in Oregon. It makes living here very difficult. You cannot own a home here a single person unless you moved here 20 years ago or more.
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Most of the discrepancy you're talking about is rural vs. urban or suburban costs of living.
You're also not counting the value of living in a place like Oregon vs. a place like Phoenix or Kansas. If you don't see this value, then perhaps you'd like it better in those places anyway?
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How is that PDXOutdoors? Do you know where I lived in these locales? You seem to know. Because I say Kansas you are assuming I lived in an rural area? You are incorrect on all accounts. I do think my value as an educated professional here deserves a salary on par with locales where the cost of living a half of what it is here. I do think that my salary here should be on par with metro with 6 times the population.
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So if people that work here feel their value professionally is being undervalued then they should just leave? And you are so smug as you think that everyone values Oregon over other places? That I had a CHOICE to move here? I think I'd rather see people like you leave this town.
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Per capita personal income is one of many, many indicators and the business community is giving it too much attention. As noted in a recent report by economists at the Oregon Employment Department on per capita personal income (http://www.qualityinfo.org/pubs/pcpi/pcpi.pdf), many causes of our lagging the national average are beyond Oregon's control, and raising it might not be an attainable goal. They note "if Oregon attracted 10 companies, each with 1,000 jobs, and all of those jobs paid $100,000 per year, Oregon’s PCPI would rise from 91.2 percent of the U.S. level to 91.8 percent. An improvement, to be sure, but also evidence that it would take a tremendous number of new, highwage jobs to close the gap."
Notably, the business community offers no solutions to reducing Oregon's stubborn poverty rate, which is an economic indicator related to state spending.
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It's the white collar jobs that are lacking, bringing our pay as a state to a lower level. There are plenty of other states paying their blue collar people at the same level, if not lower than here.....
Think about it.....our minimum wage is higher than most states, so you would think that would help our average. The fact we are still lagging points to the higher income earners, not the lower.
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According to the report, Why Oregon Trails the Nation, cited above by Chuck, the problem isn't rural income, rural Oregon is like most rural parts of the courtry. The problem is low incomes received by Oregonans, when compared to equal jobs in other metro area.
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Having worked on technical issues with ECONorthwest for years now, I no longer take their work at face value. It is generally not hopeless, but they repeatedly fail to make assumptions transparent, and often inject political spin between the facts and the top line conclusions presented.
On this important economic issue, we should be comparing our purchasing power with that of other regions, not our wages, and we should be looking at medians, not averages.
Certainly Oregon has real and really important economic development issues, and I applaud the project of collaboratively planning a really sound and green economic development strategy for both the urban and rural areas of our state.
However, this heavily-spun business-lobby approach does not build trust or even basic technical accuracy in understanding what is really going on, and what is really needed.
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GreeninEugene, I'd love to talk. Please contact my through our website. Jody Wiser, Tax Fairness Oregon
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Also, per capita personal income (PCPI) RELATIVE TO THE NATION --- which is Tapogna's report's measure --- is NOT a measure of whether Oregon can afford the state spending Oregonians want. Over the long term per capital personal income has gone up, not down, as alleged by some. Tapogna and the business community are wrong to be focusing so much on income relative to the nation.
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Do your guests have any specific policy recommendations? All I'm hearing so far is obvious, vague "we need..." statements. Specifically, what policies are they advocating for?
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Number-six, that's a great question.
My fear would be that the approach here is to soften us up with a mom-and-apple-pie top line summary - "heck, Joe, don't ya think we should be making more around here?" - which is followed up more quietly at the legislature with the tired old laundry list of business concession requests, around taxes, environmental and social regulations, land use requirements, etc.
The same tired requests to tear down much of what has gotten us to this place we love, in exchange for short-term gains for narrow interests. Bait on raising average wages, switch to tricks for profiteering.
That might be why the "ask" is so vague for now.
A different approach would be a broad spectrum consensus-oriented collaboration that pools thinking and perspectives on shared needs and values, defining our real regional competitive advantages, and how to create sustainable win-win long-term strategies for our communities.
Yes, our economy (and of course, our environment as much or more) presents a lot of challenges. Got to get all the voices in the room and actually work it out together!
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GreenInEugene,
Exactly. Doesn't everyone see the disconnect between the Oregon Business Alliance wanting higher wages? Heck, if that's their main concern, how about the members of the OBA just give their employees raises?
There is a snake in the grass here and it's clearly an opening salvo for advocating a more "business friendly environment" (read: lower business taxes, more concessions to business interests, etc.)
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They have a long list of recommendations. From the brochure for the Summit held on Monday: Ten Initiatives to Promote High-Wage Job Growth. Oregon InC $, Business development tools and access to capital, Regulatory and Permitting simplification, industrial land availability, cut trees and $ to the biomass industry, energy efficiency, infrastructure projects, training of employees by the public, water from the Columbia for farmers, tax changes. The Agenda and Plan Summary says "Details at www.oregonbusinessplan.org/industry-clusters.aspx " but I can't find it there. There is more detail on these in the hand out from Monday, but you're right, it's gimme all the way.
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I think that this is a cultural phenomenon. Culture drives economy. It informs folks what they want to buy, what they want to spend their time doing (working or playing) and what they value (their time, or more money?). In Oregon, there is a large part of the population that, given a choice, would prefer a job with a lower wage but a living wage, that allows the flexibility they desire to enjoy their non-work life.
Perhaps the MOST impactful component is migration fueled population growth. The people that are moving to Oregon fall into to main categories, one is young professionals and families who are moving here because they didn't like where they were before, want a higher quality of life, and who bring their skilled labor with them. Before the economic downturn, a lot of these imports came to Oregon (Portland) without a job, and then started looking, creating more supply, driving down prices.
The other group is the fundamental group that formed Oregon in the first place, which are people with libertarian (in the purest sense, they want a big bubble to live in) sensibilities who expect to have a low cost of living, and aren't really interested in being part of the community they're joining, or paying taxes to support it.
All of this is on top of a HUGE economic downturn, the effects of which are increased supply of workers and additional downward pressure on wages.
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If you do not have manufacturing and sell to the world, you are not ever going to have a robust long term economy. You will ride bubble to bubble and each 'pop' will be increasingly worse.
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Agreed, I've enjoyed watching Germany manufacture it's way out of it's recession... maybe they're the ones we need to approach for ideas...
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Rethomas
Germany.
And German law requires corporations to be accountable to shareholders and the workers, in contrast to US law where corps are only responsible to shareholders and not workers.
When business and labor work together everybody wins, when they fight each other all but a very few lose.
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It is touching that the panel has so much concern about the government losing tax revenues when the people are losing the use of the money they earn by ever higher taxes and anti business taxes and policies.
We had our chance in the last gubernatorial race and selected and idiot who thinks that state liquor store employees" jobs are as good as private sector jobs. Government doesnt create jobs, it can only create an atmosphere conducive to business. There is a reason jobs go to Tennessee and Washington state. The states are more business friendly. The last place I would start a business is one like Oregon there is just too many states who actually try to attract business, Idaho,Texas, Tenn and the research triangle around North Carolina.
Get out of the way of private enterprise and stop thinking having low paid attorneys is a problem. Lower taxes and remove impediments to starting and maintaining small businesses.
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There is also a reason that those places aren't as nice to live as Oregon is. Not ALL business and growth is friendly to the long-term interests of the residents. There have to be choices, incentives, penalties. Private enterprise has private interests, which are sometimes at complete odds with public interests. West Virginia is a great example of this. One of the richest corporations (and man running it) in the country there, but the average resident is poor and sick.
I agree, very much, that impediments to small business and sustainable (sourced with local resources) manufacturing need to be lowered. It's not a matter of simply 'getting out of the way.' Have you heard of The Tragedy of the Commons? If you let individuals and corporations run amok, they will each use up as much as they can, get away with what they can, and there will be nothing left.
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If many of the jobs go to Washington state compared to Oregon, why is the unemployment rate just north Portland, on the other side of the river, just about the same or higher than in Oregon?
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"Staying and making it work" is another example of a good trait that contributes to lower per capita personal income and why per capita personal income should not be getting the attention it is getting.
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Well put, csheketoff.
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Government, often in partnership with business, views growth as the solution to funding problems. The speaker remarked that if Portland incomes were on par with Seattle, we'd have $85 million more for schools. But Washington currently has a $5 billion budget shortfall. The fallacy in that line of reasoning is that growth brings in more people who demand more services, and providing more services that are already inefficient makes the problem worse, not better.
Sustainable thinking requires that we consider growth in tandem with efficiency in order to balance funding with expenses. We don't need higher wages if our cost of living is low. But we seldom hear discussions by policymakers about how to lower the cost of living. It's much easier to cheerlead for growth, because improving efficiency requires analysis, introspection, and auditing of public services. If the public wants a better quality of life, the first place to look is in how public services are delivered and what can be done to improve their efficiency while still providing what we need as a society.
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This is right on the money.
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And as if on cue, I hadn't read my copy of The Oregonian yet when I wrote the intial posting. On the front page is an article about Multnomah County paying a consultant $138,000 for a report to find cost savings in operations and no one has read it. So not only is government not interested in improving efficiency, they actually spend money on studies about it that get thrown in the dustbin with no action taken.
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First, I moved to Oregon in 2006 from NW Washington. I do a very similar job here to what I did when I left my job in Washington to move here. I make less than 1/2, on an hourly basis, of what I was paid at my job in Washington. One of the reasons is that I work for the State of Oregon here but worked for a private employer in Washington, so I get a big laugh out of all of the people who complain about how overpaid state of Oregon employees are.
Second, the first thing I noticed when I moved to Oregon is how many fewer people have a higher level of education than high school and how much less willing the people of Oregon and the state of Oregon seems to be to fund education, at all levels, than what I experienced in Washington. There is no doubt in my mind that this factor alone accounts for a great deal of the difference in wage levels that we experience in this state.
Darrell Roberts
Hood River, OR
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When I moved here from another state, I knew I was going to get paid 10 to 20% less than had I not moved. But the cost of living here more than made up for it. Housing costs and rent were 30% to 50% less. The quality of life here is higher. Leave things they way they are, bringing oregon income to parity with the rest of the nation will cause living costs will rise, it is a no win situation, although it might help Oregon get out of the foreclosure crisis a bit sooner.
Bob
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A major part of the problem is that over the last thirty years we have given in to the Conservatives massive wealth redistribution schemes. They always promise that if we only give them more tax cuts and De-Regulate them more they will create a Conservative Utopia of more jobs and more growth of wealth among the lower classes.
So we have given "wage" raises to the wealthy in the form of tax cuts and De-regulations and they have bought up small businesses, consolidated them into large Corporations and fired the former owner-managers for "efficiency", killing off small businesses and jobs.
We need to rescind those thirty years of tax cuts and go back to investing in our people and in our childrens educations and Re-Regulate Corporations back down to a size that does not threaten our small business people and jobs.
Conservatism has been and still is the problem!
The "Wal-Marts" are job and wage killers and are bad for the real economy.
We need small businesses and more and stronger Unions in order to grow jobs and wages and really support The People and thus our State and Nation!
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I'd love to test this assertion by comparing all the "new money" earned by the rich since, say 1964, and that spent on Welfare, Medicare/Medicaid and other social/entitlement programs put in place since that time... it would settle the question in my mind once and for all... thanks Tom.
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Portlalnd & Oreogn biggest problem: lack of corp. hdqtrs = few $100K + jobs, increase revenue, create hub for like business to locate (like our Nike: sports/appearal hub.) When GP left for Atlanta the merge, acquire, relocate trend trend.
1970's Portland housing was a steal compared to other West Coast cities. Home appreciation slowly crept up - still bargain basement for WC cities. People moved in, we livedo on growth bubble. Creative types flocked, MBA's left for corp hub cities.
Bottom line: Our business demographic (salaries) unable to fund housing and cost of services to pay for schools, infastructure, etc.
The bubble has burst - we're left with reality: Portland is not a corp. hub city. Need a miracle.
Suzanne
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Not only is poverty a topic the business community does not address, but also income inequality. Work alone, is not a path out of poverty for many working families with children.
The best investments we can make to boost overall income and address income inequality are investments in education -- pre-K through higher ed -- that benefit ALL Oregonians, not just the wealthy. And that takes tax dollars.
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"Is this the same old debate, in a more stressful time?"
Exactly.
So, it's time to raise the level from tired old debate, to real constructive collaboration. For that we need all the voices, a full-spectrum of technical verifiers, etc.
We know how to do that on a local level, even if it's not that widespread yet. I wonder if we could figure out how to do real collaboration using radio?
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Emily, I'm glad that you let that last caller run as long as possible. I think that sometimes good points get cut short to comply with time schedules and I'd rather see more flexibility overall.
So cheers to you!
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As a small business owner, I have always paid people well in comparison to our industry standard. This is because I try to find nice, knowledgeable, bright and service oriented people - and then I want to hold onto them. I would rather hire top notch people for fewer hours then less loyal or knowledgeable people for many hours at a low wage. People who work here tend to stay for many years. If you can retain employees for years, and have people who are wonderful to work with for both you and your customers, what better investment is there for your business? It affects the entire climate of your workplace. Plus it takes an enormous amount of time and energy to train new people.
Paula
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Here's three cheers to you Paula, as an enlightened business owner!
Hooray!
Hooray!
Hooray!
We need more people like you and your employees!
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What I heard expressed throughout the show was that we need more creative and high-end people doing talented things, and that those people would form the basis of our economy. This seems like inaccurate thinking to me, something like what I see with "young creatives" moving here, all hoping to make a living selling art to each other.
There are all kinds of people. Not all of them are going to be running shoe designers or talented software engineers. I think we need to configure our economy so that it provides the kinds of jobs that are appropriate to the various kinds of people in the numbers that those types represent in our population.
I have no idea how this could be done, but it really seems like the right thing to do. I would not like to see a two-tier society where the talented rake in the bucks and everyone else scrambles for the crumbs.
On top of that, I'm absolutely opposed to anything like socialism -- it's been tried and failed enough times already.
Where does that leave me? Hoping that someone comes up with a brilliant new idea...
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Actually Sweden and other nations have hybrid economies that include some socialism and their people say they like it and it works very well for them.
And socialism works for the US Congress, Supreme Court, the Executive branch, and the US Military in Healthcare, so those are more examples of where it works and the people who participate in it like it.
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'socialism - it's been tried and failed enough times already.'
Hogwash
This, our, form of capitalism is what is being tried and re-tried and yet still it fails
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"Hogwash," huh?
Let's see ... socialism ...
The Soviet Union - failed. Nothing in stores to buy with rubles. Black humor motto of Soviet workers: "We pretend to work, and they pretend to pay us."
China - failed, has now adopted capitalism.
Cuba - failing, still driving 1950's cars, people turning trucks into boats to escape to capitalism and freedom. How many people are leaving the USA to live in Cuba? Does that difference suggest anything to you?
Where has socialism succeeded?
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Actually Sweden and other nations have hybrid economies that include some socialism and their people say they like it and it works very well for them.
Much of Europe seems to be headed straight down the tubes. Greece, Ireland, who's next? The sustainability of their hybrid model has been called into question.
I think we need a smart new idea that isn't what we have now, and isn't Europe either. I'm not impressed with Europe, and I don't want to see the USA go down that track.
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And socialism works for the US Congress, Supreme Court, the Executive branch, and the US Military in Healthcare, so those are more examples of where it works and the people who participate in it like it.
You're talking about government, not socialism. Of course, any society is going to have a government. But hopefully a smart and efficient government, as big as it needs to be and no bigger, not a bloated dysfunctional bureaucracy that stifles human enterprise.
"Socialism" means the gov't in control of everything, the gov't owning everything. I saw what that was like (from afar) in the Soviet Union. No thanks.
I think we need something new and smart and American. I see signs that new ideas may be coming together. I hope so...
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Trigoboff
You have to take into account the fact that George Kennan created a policy in a paper called The Grand Arena that it would be the policy of the US that it would never allow any socialism to succeed anywhere. And so it created massive sanctions on places like Cuba, the USSR, and China, to prevent their ability to trade internationally and potentially have success. That is why Cubans drive 1950s cars, the US blockaded them from buying and importing newer cars and from trading the products that they do grow or produce.
To be honest, there has been no real experiment allowed of actual pure socialism anywhere to see if it would work.
But there have been hydrids like Sweden that do work.
The US has a history of stealing natural resources from other nations, I suggest that we also steal any good ideas too, like single payer government run health care, like our Congress has.
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for some, capitalism is a religion, and the bankers are like the pope, infallible, and Money's true voice on Earth.
Others do not mind, or perhaps do not realize, that they are the capitalists' prey; their money is the blood the capitalist sniffs out, then, by this vampire capitalist, the poor individual is seduced into revealing his neck, for a promise of immortality, or at least a share of the loot. Ah! but one never gets the promise in writing, and in any case, no one can really read their fine print - and so our poor sucker was sucked dry and left flat broke.
Well, this is an imaginative way of putting it, almost as imaginative as M. Trigoboff's version - but at least i know my version is metaphor-like, whereas some think the stories they have heard around and try to pass off are actually true. Like the gospel, inviolably true.
Money talks, alright, and it is all the words of a whore.
Which version is more dangerous?
I tell stories because it is impossible to have a meaningful conversation with a fanatic.
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I wonder what some would think the difference between governance and manipulation would or should be?
first define/differentiate for yourself each carefully.
my feeling is that politics has become overly manipulative and governance has suffered greatly.
i also feel that 'business' is like a wild animal caged - loose it and it tramples or eats you, because that is its nature
cage it and some weep, but misguidedly, at the loss of the 'natural order of things'
other than the flaws in any analogy i try to make, what are the problems in the conceptual relationship between government/the people/business -
what is it to be human then, when business would have us as both product and consumer, and those governing would use us as a less tangible but still real sort of power to wield.
As it is, neither is the lesser of two evils, but both more like the lessor of many evils
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Why is it always that when the issue of Socialism is raised the examples of Russia, China or Cuba are trotted out? Can you really compare the totalitarian or facist states where privacy, individual freedoms, etc. are sharply curtailed and the governement inposes involuntary communism on a Proletariat so a small ruling class can live large off the proceeds and funnel the rest into the military police that maintain the racket to the progressive socialist countries in Northern Europe? Can you?
But we are not in those parts of the world. In this part of the world, the U.S. there are well over 20 million people out of work. We also know that this number does not reflect the (millions?) that have given up ever finding work again. We also know that across ALL industries in this country the number of open job positions is less than 2.4 million. Oregon has less than four million people and I don't know how many open job vacancies but it seems that to be concerned with the wages being earned by the presently employed is... ... silly.
Going forward there are two things that can be done: the first is to immediately halve the wages of all workers thereby allowing a doubling of workforce with no additional burden on employers. This includes minimum wage workers. This option is not my favorite but since it appears impossible to consider the other option: additional taxes on those with net worths over $10 Million, it is the only viable plan.
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Regarding shopping online to save sales taxes. In many online shopping services you must read the fine print because if the vendor is based in a state with reciprocal taxing with a state that has sales taxes you will see on the checkout page the fine print which discloses the mandate to add sales taxes if the shipment of goods goes to a listed state. Regarding the bike lane argument above, I am SO d***mn sick and tired of the relentless pushing of bike bike bike bike bike. Well some of us do not have the physical ability (disability) to ride a bike and some of us work in offices where we are required to wear appropriate business attire and you aren't going to find showering/changing/lockers in most offices AND finally biking 30-60 miles to work each way might be a great way to build thunder thighs but it is not feasible for the average non-herculean middle-aged office worker. Biking is a utopian method of travel for those who make enough money to live where they want to live, travel where they want to travel on the schedule on which they want to do it. Not for the REST of us who I might remind folks as above make a third less than they did nearly two decades ago. Stop with the bike travel proselytizing, already. I am tired of having my very hard-earned taxes support the smug preachy biking elitists.
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really a panel discussion today seems to be only a very narrow range out of the broad spectrum of prominent voices on this issue
drenagem linfática
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Comments are now closed.
Why does Oregon per capita income lag by 10%?
Compare us to our sister state in the NW: Washington State.
Simply, Washington residents do not pay a 10% State Income tax.