Broken record- Wisconsin still last on jobs

Hidden in all the legal and political blows the Walker folks took yesterday is another one that underscores their complete failure. The BLS came out with their monthly state-by-state report, which shows how all the states are doing. And stop me if you've heard this before, but Wisconsin has mainted its position on top... of the bottom.

Over the year, nonfarm employment increased in 43 states and the District of Columbia and decreased in 7 states. The largest over-the-year percentage increase occurred in North Dakota (+6.8 percent). The largest over-the-year percentage decrease in employment occurred in Wisconsin (-0.6 percent).

And that's undersold, because Wisconsin has lost nearly 8,000 more jobs than its nearest "competitor" in the "50th out of 50" sweepstakes since the age of Fitzwalkerstan began.

Job change Jan. 2011- Feb. 2012
Wisconsin -11,500
Nevada -3,700
Mississippi -1,400
Missouri -1,100
Nebraska -500
Rhode Island -500

And as usual, Wisconsin continues to be in stark contrast to its Midwestern neighbors, who are seeing a major jobs boost in the Obama Recovery.

Midwestern job growth, Jan. 2011- Feb. 2012
Ohio +83,000
Mich +63,100
Minn +42,300
Ind. +39,000
Ill. +35,800
Wisc -11,500

That's right, Wisconsin is 47,300 jobs away from the nearest state in the Midwest. But none of those states have a fool like Scott Walker for governor, now do they? A couple of other notes from this Midwestern comparison stand out.

That closest competitior to Wisconsin is the state Walker keeps telling us we don't want to be like- Illinois. Well given that Illinois is creating 3,500 jobs a month more than us, and given that Illinois gained $3.8 billion in extra income taxes and $4.3 billion in overall revenues last year while Wisconsin is starting to see revenue drop and its budget deficit grow, maybe the FIBs aren't so far off, are they?

Another interesting point to see is Ohio's huge rebound, most of which has been in the last 3 months. Well, what happened in November 2011 in Ohio? Corporate puppet John Kasich had his collective bargaining law overwhelmingly repealed by the voters, a vote that was followed with dire warnings about massive tax increases and layoffs to follow if it was repealed. So what's happened? Ohio has added more than 50,000 jobs in the three months after the voters shot down SB5, and added more jobs than any state in the country in February.

Now compare Ohio's success to Wisconsin's awful record of job creation under Walker, where we started losing out on the U.S. recovery and losing jobs right after Act 10 was passed in March 2011.


Sure, you can try to say "correlation doesn't equal causation," but you certainly can't say taking away collective bargaining rights helps to GROW a state's ecnomy, and that reinstalling collective bargaining rights would slow a state's economy. That reality contradicts what the Walkers and Kasichs of the world have tried to sell us, and they must be held to account for it.

And that's why I continue to do this monthly update on Walker's total failure to create jobs and illustrate how much Wisconsin has fallen behind its neighbors in the last year as a result. Because our media refuses to tell this big story, and the Dems honestly haven't been doing enough to keep it in people's consciousness. Even the national media has ignored this angle with the Wisconsin presidential primary only 3 days away, it's like they want to generate a storyline of "he said, she said" conflict to drive election spending instead of tell the unambiguous story of the RESULTS of these huge changes - which is ABJECT FAILURE.

We need "50th in jobs" and "50th in income growth" to be a constant drumbeat for these last 2 months, to drive it through people's heads that no matter what AM 620, 1130, and 1310 and milllions of Koch-infused ads might be saying, it ain't working for Scott Walker.