If Wal-Mart Trend is Inevitable, How Can Bay County Use it to Create Jobs?
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Shoppers flow in and out of the Wal-Mart store on Wilder at State Road amid construction work as the store is in the throes of expansion.
Let's just say the Wal-Mart trend of out-sourcing jobs from the United States to China and other Asian and foreign countries is inevitable.
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It was all over for our manufacturing jobs years ago when Americans started buying cheaper foreign cars. That set the outsourcing trend in motion. Who can resist the lower prices of foreign products when there is comparable quality?
So it would be more than surprising if the voters of Portsmouth Township, despite a stong union presence in the area, turn down the referendum on rezoning for the giant retailer next Tuesday.
Frankly, most voters say, they love the lower prices and they need the jobs, even if they are low paying and have minimal benefits. They're better than nothing.
Of course there is a much bigger picture than just a neighborhood fight over location of a superstore. The Frontline program on Wal-Mart, rebroadcast on PBS last Sunday night, described the vast global shift to a "buyer-driven" economy led by Wal-Mart.
Half a century ago, General Motors was the world's biggest corporation. Today it is Wal-Mart. That fact sums up where the U.S. is economically. We have lost high-paying manufacturing jobs in a trade-off for lower prices. The American people have made that decision; it wasn't thrust upon us. We have replaced some of the good paying jobs with low-paying retail jobs at places like Wal-Mart.
Michigan and Bay County have seen the effects of this dramatic shift in the world economy perhaps more than many areas with more diverse employment bases. Bay's 4,400 manufacturing jobs represent only about 11 percent of the total current employment of 38,900. The Flint area's 21,800 manufacturing jobs are less than 14 percent of total Genesee County employment of 158,500; Saginaw has about 15 percent manufacturing, with 14,000 jobs out of a total of 92,200 employed. Flint once had more than 50,000 manufacturing jobs and Saginaw's industrial base also has shrunk dramatically.
The 1983-84 Bay County Manufacturing and Banking Directory, published by Forward Bay County, Inc., listed 136 manufacturers in Bay County in 1983-84; today the Bay Area Chamber of Commerce directory lists only about 30. While there were about 9,000 manufacturing jobs two decades ago, the latest state employment report shows 4,400 manufacturing jobs in Bay County.
Two decades ago the General Motors' Chevrolet Division here had 2,447 at work and Dow Corning had 1,000 on the job rolls at Auburn. Those companies are still mainstays of the local economy, GM's Bay City Powertrain with about 1,000 jobs and Dow Corning showing high-tech growth at about 1,200.
But the industrial landscape here has changed drastically. Among firms active 20 years ago that are no longer operating here:
Wolverine Knitting Mills, with 290 employed (270 were females);
Prestolite, 374 employed;
Dow Chemical, 217 workers;
Dow Plastic-Lined Pipe, 228 jobs;
Newcor, 262 receiving paychecks.
Stalker, 165 jobs.
Prestolite, Newcor and Stalker are gone and the work once done at the knitting mills is no doubt now in China. Thankfully, companies like S.C. Johnson, Carbone and RWC have survived and helped to picked up the slack.
The statistics of jobs we once had and no longer have would shock and amaze you. Go back 30 years and think about Defoe Shipbuilding and American Hoist, once thriving manufacturers employing about 1,000 each, destroyed by offshoring and outsourcing.
But at this point it's toolate to try to save the bulk of the manufacturing jobs; the trend was inevitably set many years ago. Wal-Mart is now just an additional symptom of the momentous changes that have occurred.
The big question in the Wal-Mart story is: How does Bay County use the worldwide trend to enhance the quality of life of its residents? Is this even possible? Perhaps, if Portsmouth Township uses the thousands of shoppers that will flock to Wal-Mart to help developers bring other retail and commercial enterprises to the area. Jobs will therefore be created, and perhaps some will be good paying jobs. Maybe Portsmouth will set an example for other townships to approve developments that add jobs.
If Wal-Mart will draw shoppers from the Thumb, Frankenmuth and Saginaw, perhaps Tuscola Road in Portsmouth will become a thriving business corridor. More services like medical offices, farm equipment stores, car dealers, etc., maybe even small manufacturers, may gravitate there. Tax revenues will rise in Portsmouth and the funds could be used to plan additional improvements to the township infrastructure. It could work to the benefit of local people if planners are wise and residents are positive so investors have confidence in the area.
Wal-Mart has about 200 employees in Bay County and would be expected to double that total, especially in view of the current expansion of the existing store on Wilder at State Road. The racks of groceries already have been moved into that store and shoppers are scrambling for food bargains as well as towels and socks.
People running townships around Bay City have been of the opinion that they don't have to help encourage job-producing enterprises to locate here; several projects are stalled by "not in my backyard" attitudes toward almost any kind of development. Who knows why? There are, of course, strongly stated arguments pro and con.Some folks in Portsmouth apparently have different ideas about growth; we'll see for sure on Tuesday where the majority of voters stands.
Creating a win-win situation is the obvious job of our political and business leaders, the Chamber of Commerce and Bay Future, the new public-private economic development agency. Certainly the working, taxpaying, product-buying public will be looking to them ever more intently for job-producing ideas, for new enterprises to replace the jobs lost as manufacturing continues to shrink.
The challenge of adding good paying jobs will remain a major Bay County goal whether or not Wal-Mart's new store is approved by Portsmouth Township voters on Tuesday.###
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