Friedman Failures Drive Walker’s Wisconsin

MADISON, Wis. — One Wisconsin Now Executive Director Scot Ross released the following statements regarding the 100th birthday of the late corporate propagandist Milton Friedman. Many of the failures of Gov. Scott Walker can be traced to the policies espoused by Friedman, most notably massive tax breaks for corporations and the wealthy, while attacking public investments and public employees.

“Scott Walker resurrected the late-Milton Friedman’s trickle down economic policies in Wisconsin, and it’s buried job creation for middle class families,” said Scot Ross, One Wisconsin Now Executive Director. “As conservatives celebrate the 100th birthday of Milton Friedman, his destructive, anti-Middle Class public policy ideas continue their zombie feast on weak-minded elected officials and their pro-corporate lackeys.”

While the national economy created 2 million new jobs under President Barack Obama, Wisconsin has been near the bottom of job creation, due to the failed policies enacted by Walker and the Republican-controlled legislature, including:

• Handing out $2.3 billion in tax cuts to corporations and the wealthy without any accountability that these cuts create jobs. [Legislative Fiscal Bureau, 6/9/11]
• Gutting public education by $1.6 billion, while increasing taxpayer funding for unaccountable private schools by more than $35 million. [Legislative Fiscal Bureau, 6/11]
• Hiking taxes on seniors and the working poor by $70 million. [Legislative Fiscal Bureau, 4/15/11]
• Ending the collective bargaining rights for 175,000 working men and women and taking away their ability to negotiate over issues like workplace safety. [2011 WI Act 10]
• Cutting the University of Wisconsin and Technical Colleges by nearly $400 million, resulting in hundreds of millions of dollars in new student loan debt for students. [Legislative Fiscal Bureau, 6/13/11]
• Attacking BadgerCare, FamilyCare and SeniorCare with drastic cuts, some which were thwarted, while refusing to move forward with state implementation of the federal Affordable Care Act. [2011 WI Act 32; Disability Rights Wisconsin]

“When it comes to the wreckage of Milton Friedman, it’s ‘gone but not forgotten,’” said Ross. “With pro-Friedman, corporate shills like Scott Walker running our state government into the ground, the people of Wisconsin should not forget how we got here.”