Even WMC's own survey says we need more pay and more workers. Think they'll listen?

Usually anything that involves "research" from the oligarchs from Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce is automatically ignored by me. But it seems telling that even WMC is admitting that wages are going to have to go up in our state.

A survey of 265 Wisconsin businesses found 88% of them are struggling to hire workers and more than 80% plan to raise their wages 3% or more this year, according to Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce.

When listing the reasons why businesses are having trouble hiring people, 44% said there is a lack of qualified applicants, 36% cited the labor shortage and 9% cited generous unemployment benefits, according to the Wisconsin Employer Survey.

“Wages are rising much faster than they have in recent memory,” said WMC President and CEO Kurt Bauer.

“Wisconsin does not have enough people to fill the jobs we have available, and that creates an aggressive competition for talent. We are seeing wages rise at a faster rate, sign-on bonuses, work flexibility and many other strategies from companies to attract and retain talent.”

Hey Kurt - you think that maybe having government offer options for child care and raising the minimum wage might help businesses "attract and retain talent"? And maybe you "business leaders" should have recognized that Wisconsin has been paying some of the lowest wages in the Midwest for years, including the lowest manufacturing wage in the Midwest in the last quarter that the Bureau of Labor Statistics tracked it.

Average weekly manufacturing wage, Midwest Q2 2021 Ill. $1,392
Minn $1,386
Mich $1,322
Ind. $1,242
Ohio $1,222
Iowa $1,183
Wis. $1,178

You can dig into WMC's presentation at this link. And I noticed a couple of other interesting responses from WMC's selected group of employers.

But while more than 1/2 of these employers claim the state's economy is "strong", WMC will tell you that Tony Evers is somehow holding the state back. Surrrrre.

Here's the other question that stood out to me, that also isn't what WMC wants you to believe.

WMC tells us that cutting "regulations" and "taxes" are what will cause a boom in Wisconsin. But a total of 7% of the employers they talk to say that's their top concern, while more than half say it's the availability of labor.

Since it's clear that we need to make moves that assist in attracting talent and convincing people to come to Wisconsin to work and raise their families, why does WMC continue to blindly give millions of dollars supporting Republicans who pass regressive garbage such as:

1. Promoting the Big Lie, trying to overturn the 2020 election, and its related voter suppression.
2. Defunding and denigration of public education, community schools, and educated people. This includes trying to prevent students from learning any sort of real history or inconvenient fact that could improve their cultural understanding and intelligence.
3. Proliferation of guns, including allowing guns on school grounds.
4. Cruel, micromanaging abortion laws that make women second-class citizens.
5. An electoral strategy of using barely-concealed racism to try to win the votes of dead-end trash while telling non-white people "you are not welcome here."

Hey WMC, if you want people to come to work here, you might want to get rid of the stupid cultural crap that repels a whole lot of people. Y'know if you actually cared about something beyond rent-seeking greed and grabbing even more power.