The results from Maine’s five-year experiment with hyper-partisan, anger-based politics are in, and they are not good.
While the U.S. economy grew by 9.4 percent between 2009 and 2014, and the New England economy grew by nearly 5 percent, Maine’s gross domestic product shrank by 1.2 percent.
That sobering distinction is noted at the beginning of Measures of Growth 2016, the latest installment in an annual report card assembled by the Maine Development Foundation and the Maine Economic Growth Council. It looks at 25 economic indicators and tracks the state’s progress toward goals for each one. In addition to GDP, Maine has either slipped backward or showed no progress toward its goals in per capita income, worker productivity and poverty rates.
The report also identifies areas of concern that contribute to these dismal statistics. Maine lags far behind the region in its investment in research and development and transportation infrastructure, and has serious deficits in critical areas of education, including fourth-grade reading scores, eighth-grade math scores and post-secondary educational attainment.
Per capita health care spending continued to outpace the nation and the region. Obesity rates – an important factor in disease prevention – remain high, while household food insecurity rose, even as the rate remained stable in New England and the country at large.
These are all familiar, long-term problems for anyone who has been studying the Maine economy, and they don’t lend themselves to easy answers.
But we have a pretty good idea of what will not work.
Take, for instance, the governor’s war on immigrants, which dominated much of the political discourse of the last two years. His misinformation campaign against “illegals,” by which he meant legally present asylum seekers, and his libelous charge that they were the source of infectious diseases straining the taxpayers’ resources, stirred up a lot of anger. He even said at one of his town halls that asylum seekers were “the biggest problem in our state.”
That might have helped get him re-elected, but it has done nothing to address the real problems that were identified in the Measures of Growth report. It has not rebuilt a single road, brought a new invention to market or educated a child.
The governor and his administration have furthered partisan goals of cutting taxes and reducing the size of government, but that has not resulted in private-sector economic growth. Rather than accept responsibility, he takes on a series of familiar punching bags like the “socialists” in the Legislature who he can blame for Maine’s lack of progress.
LePage can’t be blamed for all of Maine’s economic problems. He is not responsible for structural change in the paper industry or Maine’s aging population, but he is responsible for the state government’s response, or lack of response, to those problems.
The authors of the report correctly note that “Human capital is a critical factor in economic growth … .”
The state can’t be economically competitive without addressing “foundational issues” such as poverty, food insecurity and health. Public investment in education pays dividends as children grow up and find their place in the economy. Transportation systems and Internet connectivity are vital to successful businesses. Innovation is the source of most new businesses and new jobs.
Maine did not have five years to waste on meaningless arguments that ignore the state’s real challenges. If Maine’s leaders don’t find a way to make progress on those issues, we can expect another report like this next year.
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