Bargain-seekers may save state

A brief respite this month in the relentless upward push of Michigan's unemployment rate has the hopeful speculating that the state's long economic slide has bottomed out.

Maybe they're right, although I don't believe we've absorbed the full aftershocks of the drastic downsizing of the Big Three and their suppliers.

But even if we have weathered the worst, the question remains unanswered of how we'll climb out of this hole. Where are the real opportunities for growth?

The answer may lie in Michigan's total economic collapse. Once the state's devastation is complete, it may look like a bargain to investors hunting for a place to plant their money.

"We're already seeing it," says David Littmann, an economist with the Mackinac Center in Midland. "Waterfront property Up North is selling for a pittance. The banks are saying that buyers are coming in from Illinois, Minnesota and Wisconsin to snap up the deals."

We know what's happened to the housing market in Metro Detroit, where prices continue to fall. Attractive homes can be had in nice, livable communities for well under $100,000, and often for under $50,000.

What better way to keep our young people in Michigan than to market them on the affordability of home ownership? They can own their own house for less than rent would cost in Chicago or San Francisco.

Of course, we've got to provide places for them to work. Job creators, too, may find bargains in Michigan.

With a 15 percent unemployment rate and benefits rapidly running out for the jobless, the cost of labor is bound to drop. The state's strong labor influence has been a deterrent to attracting new businesses. But the unions have been greatly weakened by the dismantling of the manufacturing base.

Michigan will be where Mississippi was 25 years ago, willing to take any job at any wage. No need to go overseas when you can get Michigan workers at Third World rates.

Finding a place to locate a business won't be a problem. Detroit has 40 square miles of empty space, and one-third of its downtown offices are empty. Similar conditions exist across the state. Small factories that once housed parts makers can be had for a song, as can warehouses and storefronts.

Speculators will swoop in soon and snatch them up. The prices are getting so cheap, there's little risk.

And those of us in Michigan are coming to terms with the reality that nothing here is worth what it once was, including our own brains and brawn.

"We're seeing now the leading edge of this trend," Littmann says. "It will come to full flower when the rest of the country begins its rebound and Michigan is still left behind."

This isn't the best way to rebuild an economy.

But there are consequences for stubbornly resisting change.

Michigan has done nothing to alter its course, and it may be too late now anyway.

So its best hope may lie with bargain hunters and bottom feeders.

Nolan Finley is editorial page editor of The News. nfinley@detnews.com">nfinley@detnews.com or (313) 222-2064. Watch him at 8:30 p.m. Fridays on "Am I Right?" on Detroit Public TV, Channel 56.