[qjbusmaster]

Originally Posted by bobtn

Christie, like Cuomo, is actually cutting a budget as opposed to adding more job-killing taxes. One does not hear NJ's UTC's or AETNA's calling their environment the most anti-business they have run into. Their CBIA is not up in arms. Given the feelings of those three, any change to CT's jobless streak of 2 decades needs to wait until the post-Malloy period.

PS, In Wisconsin, while labor railed like 6 year olds about Walker, job growth his first month was 10,500.Gov't cost structures, and tax levels do matter if one wants to add jobs.

BTW, cancelling the ARC was WISE. Like most fed projects of its ilk, it transferes massive , recurring maintenance costs onto the states after being built, and like all massive projects (i.e. the Big Dig) you can project its costs as several times its budget.

In short, good govs know 3 words well-Cut Baby, Cut.

NICE if only NY can do that with its bloaded ass while restricting certain funds for transit enhancement

[Beeker2211]

Originally Posted by MikefromCT

We've reached our overdraft limit and he wants us to cough up more dough? Small wonder why our cities aren't economic powerhouses.

First off, I have an issue with this. Hartford is a powerhouse, albeit a low key one. Stamford is as well, albeit a bit more bombastic than it realistically is.

You want to go back to manufacturing in the US? Let the dollar slide and change the tax code so companies can no longer get reimbursed for "US" losses while payout "foreign" profits. More locally, if CT wants manufacturing back in a big way, it will have to bribe the way other states have. Taxes were low on the list, free money was near the top. So the middle class doesn't have money for what it needs, but we have enough to give to corporations to try to entice them to stay until that gravy train is out?

I just don't get it.

~Cheers

[MikefromCT]

Originally Posted by Beeker2211

First off, I have an issue with this. Hartford is a powerhouse, albeit a low key one. Stamford is as well, albeit a bit more bombastic than it realistically is.

You want to go back to manufacturing in the US? Let the dollar slide and change the tax code so companies can no longer get reimbursed for "US" losses while payout "foreign" profits. More locally, if CT wants manufacturing back in a big way, it will have to bribe the way other states have. Taxes were low on the list, free money was near the top. So the middle class doesn't have money for what it needs, but we have enough to give to corporations to try to entice them to stay until that gravy train is out?

I just don't get it.

~Cheers

You know, I'm glad your brought this up. Because even though we now know that excessive taxation was responsible for jobs drying up, you're right that corporate welfare (specifically in the form of major tax breaks and little or no regulation) isn't really the answer either. But this is what states have been doing for decades. When the economy was sagging in the late '70s and early '80s, states and municipalities began offering tax incentives to corporations to get them to relocate or to stay put. In 1977, only a handful of states were doing this. By the early '90s, hardly a state was without them. And the reason they did this was because it was believed that this was a way to create jobs (or at least retain them.) But this rarely works. There's a book by Greg LeRoy called No More Candy Store that confirms what you said - that for all the special treatment that companies got they rarely remained true to their word.

PS, re: manufacturing - I hate to say it, but that's soemthing that will NOT be coming back to this state. Not that I don't want it to, I just don't see it happening. There's no incentive to, while in China women give birth on their lunch hour and by that afternoon they're back on the assembly line painting lead onto Barbie dolls.

[bobtn]

NJ was able to reduce municipalities costs, as many of the public union restrictions from bargaining requirements, also are given to municipalities. That should keep the municipality financial situation at minimum neutral to the pre-Christie era.

[bobtn]

Mike, If one works the deals well, incentives work. Nashville was named #1 on Relocation America list 3 times, in top 5 2 other times, over 10 years, with incentive laden deals defining every imaginable criteria, including local job quantity, local median gross pay, length of employment tenure locally, and best of all, over 2/3 the value of ex Gov Bredesens' megadeals were not out of pocket. Most often, it was free, unused for decades land, and short-term tax abatements. Most who study this stuff , intentionally, fail to compute the benefits of the suppliers who follow, and they get squat. Once you get the auto plant, the L-P Inc, or the like, to relocate, the suppliers are hostages who need to come to service the king. So you tax them, with no breaKs of any kind.

However, until the (Ct) crazy closed shop wage scales, feather-bedding work rules, near US high electric rates per kilowatt hour, and outrageous property taxes fall to US standards, there will be no meaningful relos of any corps coming to Ct. Which means Malloy should disband the Economic Development Department, and stop wasting that money.

[relo-to-nc]

Originally Posted by texan2yankee

That’s how the Hartford Courant describes it,

That is why Bayer AG, Pfizer & Perkin Elmer left. High tech for greener pastures. Perkin Elmer said Waltham MA (outside Boston) was much more economical feasable than Norwalk!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[kidyankee764]

Originally Posted by Beeker2211

First off, I have an issue with this. Hartford is a powerhouse, albeit a low key one. Stamford is as well, albeit a bit more bombastic than it realistically is.

I'm not really following this thread, but this caught my eye. Stamford has the headquarters of some of the largest financial names on Wall Street, you think the city's power is exaggerated? Do explain.

If anything, I think the hedge funds fly under the radar, as most aren't located in downtown.

[gilfman]

Originally Posted by kidyankee764

I'm not really following this thread, but this caught my eye. Stamford has the headquarters of some of the largest financial names on Wall Street, you think the city's power is exaggerated? Do explain.

If anything, I think the hedge funds fly under the radar, as most aren't located in downtown.

However Charlotte, NC is 2nd in Financial Sector behind NYC....

Taxes.................

[JViello]

Originally Posted by gilfman

However Charlotte, NC is 2nd in Financial Sector behind NYC....

And bailout money.

[kidyankee764]

Originally Posted by gilfman

However Charlotte, NC is 2nd in Financial Sector behind NYC....

Taxes.................

So you're trying to equally compare a city with three quarters of a million people to a city that has 122,000 people?