Show em what they've won

So who among us could have predicted that the year long Amazon HQ2 grift would have a happy ending?  It sort of does, anyway.  I mean, from the looks of things, Amazon, the global behemoth built on horrific labor exploitation and led by the world's richest man, is still going to get its multi-billion dollar gift from the public coffers of three states.  The happy news, though, is that a growing portion of what we might call the media and political mainstream is beginning to recognize that this is a bad thing.

Was this national auction nothing more than a scripted drama to raise the value of the inevitable winning bid? And did the retailer miss an opportunity to revitalize a midwestern city by choosing to enrich the already-rich East Coast?

All good questions. But here’s the big one: Why the hell are U.S. cities spending tens of billions of dollars to steal jobs from one another in the first place?

Every year, American cities and states spend up to $90 billion in tax breaks and cash grants to urge companies to move among states. That’s more than the federal government spends on housing, education, or infrastructure. And since cities and states can’t print money or run steep deficits, these deals take scarce resources from everything local governments would otherwise pay for, such as schools, roads, police, and prisons.

In New York, where the Governor offered to change his name to "Amazon Cuomo" in what we hope was a joke, the criticism has extended now into the state house and even the US House of Representatives. Those voices remain significantly marginalized, of course. But it's a positive step.  We're still making the super-rich super-richer at the great expense of everybody else. But it's now somewhat accecptable to be critical of that.

Even in Louisiana, you start to see the tide begin to turn a little bit.  It's not happening fast enough, obviously.  Here, for example, is the Governor still happy to hand out public money and favors to hotel developers. Legislators are proud of their restrained compromise decision to only give away $180 million a year to movie productions. All of New Orleans continues unquestioningly to celebrate the Amazon-style package it bestowed on DXC last year in order to help subsidize that company's international cost-cutting and downsizing strategy. And, of course, Louisiana entered its own gift package into the Amazon sweepstakes worth an estimated $6.5 billion.

But even here there are signs of a developing pushback.  For exaple, last year J.P. Morrell, who unfortunately continues to support a lot of these tax incentive deals, at least began to subject them to greater scrutiny.   Also last December, the Advocate ran a major in-depth report by Rebekah Allen on the Industrial Tax Exemption which has been one of Louisina's most costly giveaways and particularly damaging to local municipalities and school districts.  The Governor has granted local taxing authorities more discretion to approve or deny ITEP requests as of late. Some of them have even begun to exercise this discretion. Most notably, the Orleans Parish School Board recently denied such a request from Bollinger.  Baton Rouge teachers actually voted to walk out on Halloween in order to protest an ITEP break  for Exxon.  That issue is currently on hold.

So the good news is there's progress.  We're still losing but people are finding their voices have more reach than they once did.  Speaking of which, here is a video.