Home » Authors » Morton Marcus

Morton Marcus

Articles

EYE ON THE PIE: Indiana: the land of convenience

What advantage does Indiana have over other places? Living here gives you more time for living. Put differently, Hoosiers drive fewer minutes each way each day to and from work compared to many people living in other parts of the nation. The May 7 issue of U.S. News and World Report lamented the stress placed on Americans by gridlock. It discussed the “war on traffic” and suffocating congestion. With hope, the authors pointed to new transit systems and trafficmanagement techniques…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: Can Big 10 show us more than sports?

There is an issue of greater importance than gay marriage, abortion or the tragedies of Iraq and Afghanistan. State regulation of interior designers is a matter of such public concern that the Indiana Senate supported it by a vote of 44-5 and the House, 62-34. Then, when we finally had the public protected from the inappropriate placement of sofas, the governor goes and vetoes the bill. Mitch, the spoilsport. Well, there is always next year. The governor could not stop…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: Earnings per job up, but not all is well

Economic development is all about gaining jobs and increasing earnings per job. The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) just released county level earnings and employment data for 2005. “Who cares?” you say. “You should,” I say. “These are the most comprehensive reports for more than 3,000 U.S. counties. They help explain how county economies are performing and the dynamics of change.” “But they’re old data,” you say. “First, 2005 has to end before we can have data for the…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: Bullying behavior beyond the playground

Bully: “a blustering browbeating person; especially: one habitually cruel to others who are weaker” (Merriam-Webster’s On-line Dictionary). I don’t want to overstate the case, but much of the news lately has been about bullies. Without any psychological qualifications, I see bullies as those who view themselves as weak persons or victims of abuse. They then use intimidation or violence to compensate for the injustice and indignity they perceive being imposed on them. The Virginia Tech massacre appears to have been…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: For sale: an American house of cards

A chicken in every pot and a car in every garage. Herbert Hoover never said those words, but they were part of his presidential campaign literature in 1928. Should they be the goals of American politics? Should we subsidize the price of chicken to keep poultry and grain farmers happy while consumers pay less at the grocery? How about lowering the cost of owning an automobile by allowing automobile interest payments to be refunded as tax credits? Along with these…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: A useful program for Indiana’s future

I could see she was mad when I walked in the coffee shop. State representative Roberta Righteous was adding packet after packet of sugar substitute to her extra large macho mocha. As I sat down with my cup of regular, she blurted, “Your column last week was another cruel attack on the General Assembly. All criticism, all sarcasm, but no constructive suggestions for progress.” “You want constructive ideas,” I said, “I’ll give you some. “First, Indiana abandons partisan redistricting. When…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: Time to stop being timid and tell the truth

The latest data from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis show that Indiana ranks 33rd in per capita personal income. Fifty years earlier, in 1956, Indiana ranked 17th in the nation. Our state is in long-term economic freefall and we suffer with representatives who piddle away their time on raising revenue through gambling. Per capita personal income in Indiana has not been on par with the nation since 1966. We have a record of ongoing decline, interrupted briefly from time…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: Whom will the state subsidize next?

Last week, I was walking on the Statehouse grounds and I saw some folks with large green pins on their lapels. “What do those stand for?” I asked. “Small businesses need Electronic Gaming Devices” one wearer told me. “That’s for bars,” I commented. The reply I got was not friendly. In the newspapers and on TV during the same week, there were features about horse breeders “needing” more state subsidies from slot machines at racetracks to “keep the industry alive.”…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: Indiana less entrepreneurial than nation

For many people, owning a business is a dream. As a nation, we idolize such people as “entrepreneurs.” We assemble data that show “small business” as the heart of the economy (even though the definition of “small” is fewer than 500 employees). Let’s look at this segment of the economy. Oops. The data we have are not as good as we want. We do not know how many proprietors or business operators are full-time and how many are part-time. It…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: Repair shop teaches valuable lesson

This is a true story. For several weeks, we had a rumble, rattle or otherwise disturbing noise in the right rear of our van. One day, I did get out of the van and looked at the muffler and tailpipe. Finding no apparent problem, I continued to the shopping center. Within minutes, there was a significant thump from the right rear undercarriage. The rumble turned to a hard dragging, scraping sound. I found the right rear shock absorber hanging down,…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: Unsolicited advice for IU’s next president

Congratulations, Dr. McRobbie, on being selected as Indiana University’s next president. I’ve read that you are committed to helping IU become more active in the state’s economic development. I’ve heard that from every IU president since I arrived in 1970. To be successful, it will take major changes. It is not sufficient to appoint a committee of administrators who then request each part of the university to submit a list of its “economic development activities” for ultimate inclusion in a…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: What’s wrong with property taxes?

So much is going on in the Indiana General Assembly that it makes my head spin, which makes me dizzy and unfit for driving safely on the roads. That, plus the recent heavy snows, has made me a hermit. To re-enter society, I called Dr. Werner von Fizzle, the only psychologist I know who provides at-home consultations. As he sat down, Dr. von F asked, “Do you have some tonic vater?” I nodded and rose to fill his request. “And,”…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: What is the truth about jobs in Indiana?

It seems I have to write this column every year. Our elected leaders and their appointees are once again telling us how many jobs they have brought to us through their superlative efforts. Have pity on them. They know what they are doing, but they don’t know what’s going on. Yet, you and I will go to the polls and judge them based on the number of jobs they bring to the city, county or the state when we vote…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: Are we spending too much on pets?

“It’s such a hassle, day after day after day,” she said. “What’s a hassle?” I asked. “Oh, you know,” she answered, mixing her yogurt deep into the cereal. “Why,” she continued without continuity, “don’t you write about global warming? It’s a very serious problem that they need to do something about.” “Who are ‘they’?” I inquired. “All the big guys,” she said “the power brokers, the decision-makers and the office-holders, all of them.” “Pandy,” I said politely, “global warming and…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: Elected officials inherit problems

Outside of Marion County, this is probably unknown. Even inside the county, few are aware of Mayor Bart Peterson’s proposal to issue $450 million in bonds because of shortfalls in the money available for police and fire pensions. These are obligations to those who served before 1977. The issue seems too complex for most of us to get into. Also, it’s something going on in Marion County. Who cares? If it isn’t the Colts, does it matter? Despite these feelings,…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: Where are the best-paying jobs?

Where is the best place to work if all you consider is money? Where are the wages and salaries plus benefits paid by employers the highest? We have data from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis that help us answer the question. The data refer to 2005, the latest year available, and do not include self-employment; thus, only jobs working for someone else are counted. And remember, these data are by place of work, not place of residence. Where are…

Read More

Lottery lease plan has fatal flaws EYE ON THE PIE:

Folks I talked to, Democrats and Republicans, liked the governor’s State of the State speech. The fault they found was that the speech was scheduled opposite the Indiana University basketball game with Iowa. Isn’t that an impeachable offense in Indiana? The part of the speech that intrigued me most was the idea about leasing the rights to the lottery to get money to establish scholarships and endowed chairs at our universities. The idea is to slow or reverse the brain…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: You didn’t know him and now he is gone

A quiet gentleman died last week. It did not make the headlines. Ken Miller never did make headlines, but he was part of your life and the lives of all Hoosiers for many years. If you thought of him at all, it was as taking your money, yet all that time Ken was carefully saving you money and modernizing state government. For 14 years, Ken was Indiana’s commissioner of revenue. It was to his office that you sent your income-tax…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: Mirror, mirror, which is fairest tax of all?

With some hesitation, I take you inside the men’s rest room at the Statehouse. There, I found a new member of the General Assembly combing his hair over his otherwise empty scalp and asking, “Mirror, mirror on the wall, which is the fairest tax of all?” The mirror responded, “The sales tax is the fairest of them all.” Startled, both the legislator and I looked around, only to hear another mirror say, “No, the income tax is fairest of them…

Read More

EYE ON THE PIE: In 2007, sweat the little things

This time of the year, serious people make serious resolutions about important matters; people like me, experienced and lacking determination, avoid resolutions. If, however, I were to recommend resolutions to business and government leaders, my list could be condensed into this: Attend to the little things. For too long, we have heard the preaching of management gurus and public-policy mavens that we must keep our eyes focused on the bigger issues. If you are a decision maker, you are supposed…

Read More