September 13, 2011

Ohio’s Employment Picture: Bleak and Bleaker

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I know, Labor Day was last week, but in case you missed it, there’s a dismal new report out from the think tank Policy Matters Ohio about the state of my home state. According to it, wages have declined in 10 states in the last 10 years. Leading the pack? Ohio, which I’ve been blathering about since I spent a month there reporting on its abysmal employment prospects and its abysmal actual jobs. Its median wage decline—of 86 cents an hour—over the past decade has been steeper than that of Michigan, which is more famous for its decrepitude, and also the only place I ever came across a dead body on a sidewalk.

More fun facts about the Buckeye State: For the first time in 20 years, not even half of 16- to 24-year-olds are employed. Only about half of African-Americans are employed. Just a little more than half of women are.

But not all of the 26 pages in the report are bad news. Just 23 of them are. The last few include the ways the Ohio legislature could turn the trend around and save the day. Like by not cutting local government budgets by 50 percent and by not slashing school funding. Aw, wait. That’s the exact opposite of what the legislature is starting to do right now.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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