Fascist Chicago?

One of the hallmarks of fascism is correctly outlined in Wikipedia:

Fascists advocate: a state-directed, regulated economy that is dedicated to the nation; the use and primacy of regulated private property and private enterprise contingent upon service to the nation or state; the use of state enterprise where private enterprise is failing or is inefficient.

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel is out with a commentary in WSJ that would make Mussolini proud. In the commentary, he announces a partnership between certain Chicago-based corporations and Chicago-based community colleges. Emanuel writes:

Despite stubborn unemployment, we have companies offering well-paying jobs that have to go begging for skilled applicants. This is because our community college system, which was a worker's ticket into employment and the middle class during the postwar boom, has failed to keep pace with today's competitive jobs market. Consequently, in a 21st-century economy, our workers still have 20th-century skills...

This situation will only get worse. In the next 10 years, the Chicago area will need 9,000 additional computer-science workers, 20,000 new transportation workers and 43,000 new health-care workers, including 15,000 nurses.

In order to fill these jobs, we need to modernize our community colleges so that Americans no longer regard community colleges as a last ditch effort for a remedial education, but as their first choice for high-skill job training...

So, last week I announced a series of partnerships between our community colleges and our top employers that will draw on their expertise to develop curricula and set industry standards for job training in high-growth sectors like health care, high-tech manufacturing, information technology and professional services.

This program, "Colleges to Careers," will team AAR Corp. with Chicago's Olive-Harvey College to design a curriculum for avionics and mechanics careers. It will partner companies like Allscripts and Northwestern Memorial Hospital with Malcolm X College to design job training in health-care information technology and nursing.

These partnerships will align workers' training with the expectations of employers so that community college students will not have to worry about whether they have the right skills for their chosen field. They will have the confidence of knowing that the company they want to work for has helped design their curriculum specifically so that they can be hired and be successful. Employers won't need to search for the skilled workers they need to invest and expand. They will have confidence in their future work force because they were a partner in shaping it.I hope that cities across the country will follow Chicago's model.

If we revive and modernize our training programs to match the needs of our high-growth industries, our community college system can catapult millions of people into employment and into the middle class, as it has done for generations of Americans.

The question which must be asked is if this type of education is in demand, why isn't the private sector offering it?  The private sector offers everything from bartender school to medical school. Does the mayor seriously think that mechanics teaching would not appear on the scene if the pay was high enough for mechanics?  This "partnership" with industry smells an awful lot like corporations getting their employees trained by the city of Chicago through the community college network.

It will result in an increase in supply, with little cost to corporations. The Chicago taxpayer picks up the tab. In a free market. an extremely limited supply of skilled workers results in increasing salaries for those skilled workers, and private educational institutions respond by providing more classes which will increase the skill level in the areas where the higher salaries are. And the taxpayers get to keep their money!

Emanuel is a typical modern day politician, he sees any problems beyond swollen hemorrhoids as something government should solve. Eventually, it becomes all bureaucratic with more and more centralized power that works for the benefit of the politically connected.

David Storch Chairman and CEO of AAR Corp, the company that will benefit from the Mayor's new training program, is a case in point. Storch appears to be a huge suck up to the mayor. He even issued a press release after meeting with the mayor in October:

AAR (NYSE: AIR) announced today that its Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, David P. Storch was among five aviation industry leaders that attended a session hosted by Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel at City Hall where the Mayor invited business leaders to share challenges and discuss opportunities to protect and grow Chicago’s position as a leading international aviation hub.

“I was very impressed with Mayor Emanuel and the initiative that he demonstrated in pulling this group of industry leaders together in the interest of growing the local economy and creating jobs,” said David P. Storch. “The session was an excellent opportunity for aviation businesses with operations in the Chicago area to share common challenges and explore ways to advance aviation as a part of the City’s growth agenda.”

In a more recent press release, Storch indicates the earlier gushing paid off (my emphasis):

AAR (NYSE: AIR) has been selected by Mayor Rahm Emanuel's Office as aviation industry partner for a new education to careers engagement strategy between the City Colleges of Chicago and private business to prepare residents for jobs in high-growth sectors.

AAR Chairman and CEO David P. Storch joined Mayor Emanuel for the announcement of the "Colleges to Careers" initiative, which will focus on building industry partnerships for careers in aviation, healthcare, logistics, hospitality and information technology. These high-growth sectors are in need of skilled workers to fill open positions today and to build a pipeline of talent for the future. The initiative will draw on its partners' knowledge and expertise to develop the definitive standard in industry credentials, drive job creation and help increase the competitiveness of Chicago-area companies.

"This initiative will have long-term benefits for the viability of Chicago's future workforce," Storch said. "It also will help to reduce employer costs for education and skills training on the job so that the people we hire are properly trained from Day One."

How true! The cost has been shifted to Chicago taxpayers! Nice move Mr. Mayor. Yes, indeed, Mussolini would be proud.

Really Inside Chicago Politics

The arrest of Illinois Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich brings to mind a party I attended in Chicago a few years back.

It was a yuppie type party and one of the party goers struck me more like a 30-something young tough, rather than a yuppie. At some point we are next to each other and start talking. For whatever reason, people tend to confess things to me that I don't think they do with many others.

He was clearly edgy about being at the party, and points to another guy and says, "See him." I nod. "He's my cousin. He is the reason I am here. When I was a kid, I robbed a bank. I figured no one would think I would rob it again the next day, so I did. I robbed it the third day, also. The fourth day the police were waiting for me. My cousin is running for office [I think he said for alderman, but I forget]. He is short on cash for his campaign and he wants me to rob a bank for him. He tells me he will give me the money back and more when he is elected."

"Are you going to do it?", I ask.

"No," he said, "this is the first time in years that he has called me. I don't rob banks anymore, let him rob his own bank."

Some People Will Be Glad When Obama Finally Leaves Chicago

Friends tell me that many business owners are not too happy with the security implemented for President-elect Obama, since he won the election.

Not only are streets blocked off in the Hyde Park area around his home, but also around the Federal Building in Chicago's business district, "The Loop", where Obama has an office. Supposedly, another Loop location around Hilton's The Palmer House Hotel is also blocked off as Obama is holding meetings at the hotel.

Store owners are facing major declines in business at all three locations.

Very Cool, I Mean Hot

KRAFT is going to provide heat at 10 bus shelters in Chicago as a Pitch for Stove Top stuffing...If you have ever been in Chicago in the winter time, you know people will appreciate this.

ViaDrudge

Board Up Your Windows In Chicago On Election Night?

That's Chicago private detective Paul Huebl's advice.

Crashng Prices On Chicago Condos Undercuts Trump

ChicagoBusiness reports:

Investors no longer have to pay Trump prices for a piece of Donald Trump's downtown condominium and hotel tower.

At least 34 hotel suites sold by the developer in the past six months are back on the market, some priced at a steep discount to comparable unsold hotel units in the yet-to-be-completed project. They are owned by investors who signed purchase contracts before construction began on the 92-story skyscraper, aiming to flip the units for a profit after closing.

It's a potential problem for Trump International Hotel and Tower, which is having a hard time regaining early sales momentum in a downtown condo market suffering from surging supply and declining demand. Mr. Trump, who relied on early sales contracts with investors to get $770 million in construction loans, now must compete with many of them for buyers: That's tough when prices on some of the resale units are more than 30% below the developer's.

"My clients want to get out, and the only way they can get out is by undercutting the developer," says broker Andrew Glatz, who has listings for 18 hotel units in the building at 401 N. Wabash Ave.

Mr. Glatz has listed a one-bedroom hotel suite on the 25th floor for $1 million, well below the $1.5 million a buyer would pay Trump for a comparable unit.

He's also trying to sell a two-bedroom suite on the 23rd floor for $2.6 million, vs. $3.2 million for a Trump unit.

The 339-unit hotel opened in January, the same time buyers started closing. Unlike a traditional hotel, where one large investor owns the entire building, the Trump project is a condo-hotel, where suites are sold individually to investors. The investors can occupy their condos and have them rented out when they're away.