While 49 other states saw their GDP expand by 3.4% Michigan's went down .5%.  

"The hard truth is that the Michigan economy remains in a one-state recession," said Johnson...

"A lot needs to go right the state economy to bottom out," he said. "The state is going through a difficult and protracted structural adjustment, not a short-lived cyclical downturn."

Johnson highlighted three sectors as the lead indicators of Michigan's struggles.  Construction, manufacturing and government services are down.  Two of them I lament.  

Of course that's not to say they're the only culprits.  Johnson's own Comerica bank announced earlier this year their plans to leave Michigan for Texas.  So apparently our banking and financial services industries aren't doing so hot either.

The report shines a spotlight on the need for substantive structural change in Lansing.  We're not, as he indicates, going through another hiccup.  These are fundamental problems that will afflict Michigan for the foreseeable future.

In other words, one time fixes will be just that.  They won't solve the problem.  

Have a $1.8 billion budget deficit?  Filling it with tax hikes might help you balance the books this fiscal year but it doesn't make the necessary course-correction to prevent future deficits from popping up next year and the year after that.  Instead it will exacerbate the problem, driving jobs and families out of the state resulting in lower tax receipts.  The budget requires a structural overhaul.  

Michigan is facing a new reality these past few years.  It's time our leaders in the House and the governor's office woke up and understood that.