“Maine, The Way Life Should Be” is great branding, but difficult to sustain, whether pursuing its promise or accommodating its shortfalls. I have been more than willing to endure the financial and cultural compromises accompanying that elusive idealization, so as to enjoy its larger measure of pretty darn close reality. In Maine, quality of place and quality of life work together to create a whole greater than the sum of its parts, but it is “some” costly. For others, particularly those in politics, Maine life “should be” to pursue all the material progress championed to our west and south, whether or not all boats rise, whether or not everyone really desires it.

Politicians think Mainers want what those in other states have in greater abundance because abundance in itself is widely held to be innately desirable. That conventional wisdom remains politics as usual. Maine must grow because growth is good. To grow, Maine must have more residents, preferably young and upwardly mobile – better still, value added entrepreneurs with distant family and friends anxious to pay a visit, vacation and shop, frequently and extravagantly.

When visitors leave, state agencies will follow them virtually, reminding them on-line of their visit and, periodically, encouraging a lifetime of Maine products patronage — L. L. Bean’s success model extended to every possible Maine business. This is a large part of Mike Michaud’s “Maine Made” initiative for economic development, similar to Eliot Cutler’s vision of capitalizing on Maine’s unique regionalism branded to a legendary quality of manufacturing workmanship. The objective is to make Maine synonymous with desirability in all things, but especially those that are marketable.

There is, however, nothing desirable in being paid poorly for manufacturing such desirable products. Boot makers at L.L.Bean get $12 to $15 per hour — a livable wage, yes, better than many Maine paychecks, and enviable, certainly, to those making Bean’s products overseas, but not even close to the way work life should be. American-made should mean fairly paid, wages which are truly desirable rather than endurable. Maine Made, priced top dollar, should translate into top wages — “from away” wages. Working Mainers shouldn’t be resigned to paying inflated in-state tourist prices with nontourist pay grades. When paying for the same lobster dinner, two workers with comparable jobs, products or services commanding similar price, shouldn’t have a 30- 100 percent disparity in incomes just because one is native and one is visiting.

Maine’s income disparity gap. That’s the way Maine life remains and always will be, it seems. The sad fact is that Maine wages are minimum wages. Working in Maine requires taking a pay cut right from the get-go. Even professionals accept that reality. No one likes it, but, without some kind of leverage, the playing field remains without much of a home advantage.

The leverage that works elsewhere is to buy investment in your state, providing what large quality employers demand and thereby attracting quality jobs. You provide infrastructure, a skilled workforce, and tax breaks — Big Boys style. Otherwise, all you get is more low paying employment — Big Box style. Sometimes you can’t win for losing to the hard reality that low paying jobs are better than no jobs.

Reality check: Maine has abysmal infrastructure, a very challenged university system, and desperately needs an increased tax base to provide for such business lures. In the real world of corporate gamesmanship, Maine isn’t able to suit up.

Michaud and Cutler acknowledge this by basically abandoning thoughts of a rescue by outside corporations, focusing, rather, on encouraging a proliferation of entrepreneurial startups and growing those established small businesses that seem to work best here.

Maine, The Way Life Should Be. LePage changed that declaration to Open for Business, likely thinking it means the same thing. Unfortunately, You Should Have Bought It When You Saw It is all about the fickleness of life’s opportunities, and Maine is no Marden’s. LePage’s chief challengers are suggesting a different Maine business approach. Their gateway signage will be Open for Small Businesses. Trouble is, small businesses, going it alone, overhead challenged and nonunion, are hard pressed to break the cycle of suppressed wages. Suppressed wages mean an enhanced bottom line.

Hopefully, Michaud’s or Cutler’s plans, promising in many respects, big on providing opportunity and assistance to employers, will be rethought to include the concerns of those also providing an important means, an essential means, of productivity.

What if politicians, so preoccupied by the influence of the business community, always pro-business, truly embraced a notion of Life As It Should Be which recognizes that our economy’s human resources, a.k.a taxpayers, a.k.a voters, need, not just a work life, but, a Work Life As It Should Be? Not just regarding income, but in all areas of employment, especially workers’ rights. What if working Mainers voted into office someone who would bring about that signage? Imagine how many skilled young people from away would be saying “ayuh” to that.

GARY ANDERSON is a resident of Bath.