[continued from previous message]   
      
   Research & Engagement found that Oregon businesses are routinely   
   recruited to expand outside the state, leading to a loss of “thousands   
   of potential jobs and billions of potential private investments in the   
   past five years.”   
      
   That two-thirds of those recruited businesses have reported “moving or   
   expanding outside Oregon” isn’t surprising.   
      
   How much faith can one retain in the local workforce when Oregon’s   
   fourth and eighth grade test scores for reading and writing are among   
   the nation’s worst?   
      
   Ponder that for a moment. Even as spending per pupil has soared,   
   Oregon’s test scores have bottomed out. The state is dead last in fourth   
   grade reading and math scores and—thank heaven for West Virginia—the   
   numbers are almost as discouraging at the eighth grade level. Those   
   scores are terrifying forecasts of economic growth and stability.   
      
   2024 Demographically Adjusted NAEP Scores. These test scores are   
   published by the Urban Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank,   
   and are widely considered the best representation of the relative   
   effectiveness of state policies on K–12 education. (Urban Institute)   
   How does one recruit talented tech workers to Portland’s central city,   
   where they will be forced to pay the highest income tax rates outside   
   the island of Manhattan?   
      
   And how long will entrepreneurs continue to believe Oregon is fertile   
   ground on which to build or keep their companies?   
      
   “We have so many regulations [that] it is very difficult to do business   
   here,” Jordan Pape, the president and CEO of The Papé Group, based in   
   Eugene, wrote in an email. “[We] need a public policy agenda that wants   
   to lure, rather than lose, business investment.”   
      
   Our cultural institutions may not otherwise survive.   
      
   Is that panic in the wings?   
      
   “Panic? Panic is the wrong word,” Vollum says. “We’re long past the   
   panic stage. We’re in the stages of grief.”   
      
   Denial? Anger? Bargaining? Depression?   
      
   “I’m more in the acceptance stage. I think all this is fixable…but,   
   ultimately, it seems voters want what they have.”   
      
   Cratering test scores. Self-defeating tax policies. Empty office towers.   
   And the lingering exhaust fumes from the Oregon companies that are   
   moving on.   
      
   Featured Local Savings   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)