It looked like the end of the millennium would also be the end of Michigan manufacturing. The state lost 47 percent of its manufacturing employment, nearly 423,000 jobs, between 2000 and 2010 as the U.S. auto industry went into a frightening decline. But like a patient who surprisingly wakes up from a years-long coma, manufacturing […]
Don Grimes
Posted inBusiness Watch
$1.6 billion shaved off Michigan property tax bills
Thousands of Michigan home and business owners have been the recipients of hundreds of millions of dollars in property tax cuts in recent years — a savings that few seem to recognize. Property owners in the state as a whole have seen property taxes fall nearly $900 million between 2007 and 2010. Adjusted for inflation, […]
Posted inBusiness Watch
Nest eggs go bad in Oakland County
When Sven Gustafson and his wife Kristen bought a home in the Oakland County community of Ferndale in 2005, it looked like a smart move. Property values had been rising steadily. Ferndale, which borders Detroit along Eight Mile Road, was becoming a haven for young professionals, artists and gay Michiganians — the “creative class” described […]