Business Week's Michael Mandel, who long has traced the oversized contribution of health care to the national economy, strikes again. If you take away jobs in health care, government and education, he says, there have been no new net jobs created in the United States since 1998.

In February 2009, there were 92,047[,000] jobs outside of health, education, and government. That's just where we were in September 1998.

Over the same period, health, education, and government added 7.2 million jobs (about 1 million of that total were non-education government jobs).

You (yes, you out there) may think that health and education are the least productive sectors of the economy. You may think that they are a drag on the private sector. You may think that the failure and cost of health and education are a cause of the problem, and not a solution.

But the rest of the economy is *not* creating jobs. Not, not, not. And no magic fairy dust can make U.S. corporations create jobs in the short run. It isn't going to happen.

On the other hand, the American people are willing to pay for access to healthcare and education, even today. And arguably, improving these sectors can pay off with enormous benefits.

This is our economic policy, folks, for better or for worse. More jobs and more spending in health and education. The health-education fiscal policy lever is the way to go.

Maryland specializes in -- guess what? -- health care, education and government. Hence our outperformance over the last decade and our (very relative) shield against terrible downturn now. Maryland's economy is in recession -- make no mistake. We started losing jobs late last year and will probably lose jobs all this year. But the state is still in better shape than the country as a whole.