Since Gov. Scott Walker took office, the state largely defanged public employee unions and enacted concealed-carry litigation.

Because imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, this state should feel flattered, for two reasons. First, from Reuters via Automotive News:

Michigan, a symbol of U.S. industrial rise and decline, is about to get a second look from corporate America.

The heavily unionized state took a big step toward encouraging business investment on Tuesday with “right to work” legislation that prohibits union membership as a condition of employment.

While Michigan must still address other problems such as its outdated infrastructure and high taxes, the legislation puts the Wolverine state in the company of 23 other states that have passed “right to work” laws to attract investment.

“We’re going to see some major investments in Michigan over the next two to three years,” said Neil De Koker, the head of the Original Equipment Suppliers Association, which represents auto component makers.

Supporters of right-to-work said it tempers industry fears of dealing with the UAW and makes Michigan more competitive against neighboring industrial states such as Ohio, which does not have such a law.

There is a right to join unions; it’s freedom of association as defined by the First Amendment. But any freedom of association must be freedom of nonassociation as well, particularly in the area of mandatory union dues.

One union shibboleth, that union membership means higher worker wages, was exposed, thanks to Investors.com:

Campaigning Monday in Michigan as it stood poised to become the nation’s 24th right-to-work state, President Obama spoke the exact opposite of the truth to union workers at a Daimler Detroit Diesel plant in the birthplace of organized labor.

“What we shouldn’t be doing,” he told the small crowd, “is trying to take away your rights to bargain for better wages. We don’t want a race to the bottom. We want a race to the top.”

Yet looking at the hard numbers, becoming a right-to-work state is a direct line to the top.

According to Michigan’s Mackinac Center, using data taken from the Bureau of Economic Analysis and Bureau of Labor Statistics, private-sector, inflation-adjusted employee compensation in right-to-work states increased by 12% between 2001 and 2011 compared with just 3% over the same period in forced-unionization states.

These good wages came from good jobs. Employment in right-to-work states expanded 2.4% over the same stretch vs. a 3.4% decline in non-right-to-work states. …

According to the National Institute for Labor Relations Research, right-to-work states (excluding Indiana, which passed a RTW law in early 2012) “were responsible for 72% of all net household job growth across the U.S. from June 2009 through September 2012.”

This is why people vote with their feet and move to these states. RTW states experienced large population gains of 15.3% from 2000 to 2010, compared to 5.9% in non-RTW states. …

If unions satisfied workers, one would expect their membership to at least remain constant. But between 2000 and 2010, union membership declined by 9.5% in non-RTW states and 9.2% in RTW states. The only growth was in government unions.

For a state as unionized as Michigan is to enact legislation banning compulsory union membership (which is what “right-to-work” legislation really is) is remarkable.

The Chicago Tribune claims it’s the unions’ fault:

Words such as “astounding” ought to be used sparingly. But a declaration from Michigan that workers can’t be forced to join unions, or to pay union dues, as a condition of employment? Does the Vatican next lop off some Commandments? Only four states have higher shares of union members than does Michigan, where 17.5 percent of workers belong to organized labor: New York (24.1 percent), Alaska (22.1) Hawaii (21.5) and Washington (19.0).

In Illinois, according to these U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics figures from January, 876,000 of the 5,408,000 workers are unionized. That’s 16.2 percent, higher than the national total, 11.8 percent. That U.S. percentage has been contracting, and if Michigan workers choose to stop paying dues as many public sector workers in Wisconsin have done, it will shrink further: Nationwide, 37.0 percent of public sector workers are unionized — five times the share (6.9 percent) in the private sector.

We offer this elaborate context for a reason: As Democratic and pro-labor a state as Michigan historically has been, what’s occurring there may well spread to other states with low job creation and high taxpayer debt — much of it unfunded public pension liabilities. No one who follows the economics and politics of Michigan can say this abrupt legislative action comes as a shock. Or that Michigan voters didn’t authorize it.

In 2010, Michigan citizens fed up with spending and debt handed total control of state government to Republicans. When Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker succeeded in restricting collective bargaining for most public employees, Michigan’s Snyder said a push for right-to-work legislation wasn’t on his agenda. Too divisive.

In this year’s election, though, unions in Michigan overreached. They aggressively promoted Proposal 2, a ballot measure that would have given public and private workers a constitutional right to organize and bargain — but also would have nullified current or future laws limiting that ability to organize and bargain. President Barack Obama defeated Mitt Romney in Romney’s native Michigan by nearly 10 points, 54.3 percent to 44.8 percent. But the same voters crushed Proposal 2, 57.4 percent to 42.6 percent, and left Lansing in Republican hands. After the election, The Detroit News editorialized, “The defeat of Prop 2, an audacious bid for union power that sought to forever ban right-to-work legislation, may prompt labor opponents to push for just such a bill.”

That’s precisely what happened.

It will be interesting indeed if the Wisconsin Legislature tries to pass similar legislation despite the lingering memories of Recallarama and despite Walker’s claim he’s not pushing for it.

Meanwhile, reports Best of the Web Today:

… Illinois is the only state in America that has an absolute prohibition on carrying a concealed firearm for self-defense.

But that’s about to change, thanks to a ruling by a three-judge panel of the Seventh U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. In Moore v. Madigan, the judges gave the Legislature in Springfield 180 days “to craft a new gun law that will impose reasonable limitations, consistent with the public safety and the Second Amendment . . ., on the carrying of guns in public.” …

In the Moore case–the plaintiff, incidentally, is named Michael Moore, though we’re pretty sure it’s not the porcine propagandist behind “Bowling for Columbine”–the state asked the court to disregard binding precedent and adopt a cramped reading of the amendment that would protect the right to keep and bear arms only in connection with “militia duty.” As Judge Richard Posner notes, “The Supreme Court rejected the argument.”

The state, Posner continues, asks him and his colleagues “to repudiate the [Supreme] Court’s historical analysis. That we can’t do. Nor can we ignore the implication of the analysis that the constitutional right of armed self-defense is broader than the right to have a gun in one’s home.”

The Tribune’s Steve Chapman says that opposition to gun rights in Illinois is like unions in Michigan, or at least it was:

It’s hard to overstate what a radical step this is in Illinois, with its stubbornly impervious suspicion of guns in general and handguns in particular. Sure, there are hunters and target shooters, but they have limited sway with lawmakers.

The resistance to concealed weapons makes it an outlier. So does its law requiring a state permit, known as a Firearm Owner’s Identification card, to buy a gun or ammunition. Chicago (along with a couple of other cities) had a complete ban on handgun ownership, which lasted until 2010, when the Supreme Court struck it down. …

Democratic state Sen. Donne Trotter opposed a bill legalizing concealed carry because it would mean “creating part-time police officers who have not gone through the extensive training, who have not had the psychological evaluations, who will be getting out there who feel now that they are stronger, they are badder, they are tougher because they have this nine-shooter on their hip.”

That statement should not be interpreted to mean the senator is opposed to the idea in all circumstances. Not long ago, Trotter was arrested for allegedly trying to board a commercial airplane with a handgun in his carry-on bag. …

What other states have figured out is that forbidding citizens from carrying concealed weapons does not enhance public safety, because it doesn’t prevent criminals from getting or packing guns. All it does is prevent law-abiding individuals from using such weapons to protect themselves. It punishes the victims, not the villains.

The same fears expressed by anti-gun alarmists here were expressed elsewhere, only to be proved groundless. A 2004 study by the National Academy of Sciences found “no credible evidence that ‘right-to-carry’ laws, which allow qualified adults to carry concealed handguns, either decrease or increase violent crime.”

When it comes to day-to-day life, in fact, the change will be no big deal. But for Illinois residents to finally have the freedom to make their own choices — now, that is a big deal.