{"id":13355,"date":"2016-07-25T07:10:58","date_gmt":"2016-07-25T13:10:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lastbestnews.com\/site\/?p=13355"},"modified":"2016-07-25T07:10:58","modified_gmt":"2016-07-25T13:10:58","slug":"montana-ethic-project-the-value-of-living-in-this-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/2016\/07\/montana-ethic-project-the-value-of-living-in-this-state\/","title":{"rendered":"Montana Ethic Project: The value of living in this state"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Power\"<\/a>

Joey and Libby Early<\/p>

Thomas Power discusses the limits of economic indicators of well-being for Montana.<\/p><\/div>\n

This is the 21st\u00a0chapter of the 32-part video series \u201cThe Montana Ethic Project.\u201d This chapter features Dr. Thomas Power, University of Montana emeritus professor of economics, discussing the subject, “Valuing Montana: An Economist’s Observations.” You can watch the whole video below. Here is how it begins:<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

“We are regularly told that the Montana economy is failing.\u00a0That is a theme that one hears, especially during the Great Recession, but also before that, during poor\u00a0times going back to the ’80s. Even during the 1990s and the first part of the 2000s, despite ongoing\u00a0growth in population and income relative to the rest of the country, in addition to lower unemployment\u00a0rates. Even during the good times in Montana we are regularly told that the Montana economy is in fact\u00a0failing.<\/p>\n

“The basis for most of those concerns that there is something seriously wrong with the economy is tied\u00a0to the fact that the most familiar metrics that we use to try and indicate how well off Montanans are\u00a0compared to the rest of the country is to look at averages: average pay per job, average income per\u00a0capita. Judged by those measures the economy certainly appears to not be allowing Montana residents\u00a0to live at as high a standard of living as the rest of the country. We\u2019re seriously behind.<\/p>\n

“That emphasis on economic failure concerns me for several reasons.”<\/p>\n

Here is another, edited excerpt from Power’s\u00a0presentation<\/em>:<\/p>\n

“In fact pay varies directly with the density of settlement. Per capita income rises directly with the\u00a0density of settlement. Citizens who live in our largest urban areas also receive the highest incomes. They\u00a0also have the highest pay per job. That is not surprising. All of us know that. If you live in Polson you can\u00a0gripe about the pay level. But all you have to do is move to Missoula and you have access to higher pay\u00a0levels. And if you don\u2019t like the levels in Missoula, you can go to Spokane, a larger city with higher pay\u00a0levels. If that is not high enough for you, you have Portland or Seattle, still higher.<\/p>\n

“We all know there is a link between how large the cities that we live in are and their level of pay. Yet\u00a0some of the largest areas, those with the highest pay per job and highest per capita income, are areas\u00a0that are losing population, states such as Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, etc., while some of the\u00a0lowest paid states in the Union, including Idaho, Montana, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico, have been\u00a0gaining population. So again people voting with their feet have been leaving what are supposedly the\u00a0rich and prosperous areas and moving to the poor, low income areas.<\/p>\n

“That tells us something about the rationality of interpreting those simple measures of pay per job or per\u00a0capita income.”<\/p>\n