Just returned home from Illinois where I attended my eldest son's graduation from a master program. I was a good trip and I found a few things to comment about.
During the graduation ceremony one of the speaker tried to get some easy applause by saying: "Are you happy?" This will usually bring a loud round of applause from the graduates. But this time the response was rather subdued. The speaker tried again: "Last year's class seemed much happier!" Usually the crowd would try to clap and yell louder to that challenge. But again the response was mild. I think the reason is that this year's graduates know the daunting task ahead of them in trying to find a job in this ec0nomy. I can't blame them. At a time where the future should be bright, they face uncertainty. Hopefully things will be better for them soon.
On the bright side Springfield, Illinois where the ceremony took place seem not to be affected by the recession. There is no change from what I saw last August when I was there. The restaurants are even busier and there are not many houses with for sale signs. This is different from California and other areas of the country I heard about. I think the main reason is that Springfield is the capital of Illinois. In a recession one of the few sectors that are still hiring is the government. So while during boom times government towns like Springfield may not benefit much, during recession these towns survive better. I think Sacramento is doing ok compare to other cities in California. Lansing is probably better off than Detroit, I think.
This was the 200 birthday of Lincoln and so Springfield is going all out to promote all things Lincoln. We went to the Lincoln museum. I enjoyed the place a lot. Particularly I like the section of cartoons about Lincoln from when he was president. It just reminds me of the politics today except the Republicans are the liberals then. Some of the stuff was racist and would not be published today, I think. But it is interesting that even back then the president is pulled from both sides. The supporters of slavery obviously hated Lincoln. But the supporters of emancipation also had harsh words for Lincoln as they think he was not moving fast enough and that he was trying to placate the other side. I am sure Obama would appreciate this. The more things change the more it is the same!
The last observation is that despite a Democratic majority in both houses and a Democratic governor, Illinois has trouble passing a budget. They are almost as dysfunctional as California! Forget about bipartianship, we may need dictatorship!
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
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Glad you had a good time in Illinois. I am sure it wasn't as crazy as last year when candidate Obama was there!
ReplyDeleteI don't know that Springfield doing better is really because it's a capital city. I think that the combination of it being a capital city and it having a college campus keeps it doing well.
If you go to any college towns, I would think that those towns are doing relatively well because of the students who buy and spend in those towns.
In Lansing things are rough because it depends so much on the auto industry. The city has tried to change itself the last 10 years and is trying to attract young people. In pockets you see areas of revitalization but there are quite a few areas where you see the foreclosure signs and closed down businesses.
However in East Lansing, you'd almost never know that there was a recession. It will be interesting after the summer because that is usually when the businesses won't have enough money coming in because of the lack of students.
I watched something on the news a few months ago about this camp in Sacramento for homeless people. If I remember correctly, it was a park or abandoned area where a few of the cities homeless set up camp. Well a year later it was filled with people who had lost their homes. Some of them were white collar workers.
I'm not in California but I would think that a situation like that would be pretty bad compared to other cities like LA and SF which will always have homeless people.
How are things in Santa Barbara? Have you been there lately? I am wondering if there are a lot more panhandlers and homeless.
I wonder if the reason for Illinois' budget problems have a little to do with not having a governor?
-LBOAYM
You are right that having a college helps a town. But I can't think of any capital city which do not also have a college. I mean MSU is in East Lansing but with such a big school it has to help Lansing also. So I don't think that Springfield has an advantage over Lansing or Sacramento which has Sacramento State College. The auto industry must affect Lansing but certainly should not be as much as it affects say Warren. Sacramento is certainly not affected by high tech industry as say San Jose. Of course now that Calif. is almost bankrupt, Sacramento is affected also. For example one auto dealer there used to sell 2000 new cars to the state government a year! Now it may not get any order since Calif. is almost out of money. So I guess there is only so much that government spending can be relied on as well.
ReplyDeleteIllinois does have a governor. The former lieutenant governor Quinn is the governor. In fact my son's next door neighbor is high on Quinn's staff. Supposedly he is a clean guy unlike most of the previous governors. Supposedly Blagoyevich didn't get along with anybody so if he was still there the budget would be stalled also. I am not familiar with the politics of Illinois but I suppose that the democrats in rural areas, specially in the southern and western parts of the state, do not like the democratic politicians around Chicago. They may vote more like Republicans than big city Democrats, and thus the difficulty passing legislation despite the majority of the party.
I have not been to Santa Barbara lately but I think it is still doing fine except for the recent fire which wiped out bunch of multi-million dollar homes. The do have pan-handlers on the beach area. But it is hard to feel sorry for this city. Couple of years ago they built these "low income" housing which were being sold for around $800,000. The target buyer? Young doctors and lawyers or two income family of say a fireman and a teacher. To me places like this are not the real world.
Actually, you are wrong about the government not benefiting during boom times. Flush with tax revenue, legislators feel free to add programs, jobs and higher benefits for their constituencies, which generally includes public employee unions. During the boom times of the 1990s, California increased public employees retirement benefits from 2% per year of employment to 3%, meaning most retired government workers in California receive a pension equal to 90% of their last year's pay. An outrageous benefit that virtually nobody in the private sector receives. And now that times are tough, it's virtually impossible to pare back those benefits. You Need to Get Angry, Yellow Man! We need a revolution, and you can't start it if you're going to go mellow yellow on us. We need outrage. And don't even get me started on the UAW!!!! They are one of the principle reasons GM is bankrupt, and Obama rewards them with a major stake in the new Government Motors. About the only thing the UAW workers gave up was their right to receive free VIAGRA (and I'm not making that up). Angry Yellow Man never needs viagra ... how else are there more than a billion chinese in the world. Maybe you've been in America too long. Forget the little blue pill, mellow yellow. Time to regain your inner anger. After all, Angry Yellow Man eats dynamite and makes fireworks. And he would never drink Obama Kool Aid. Angry Yellow Man attacks the status quo ... and let's face it, Obama (and his cash printing machine) is the new status quo.
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