Posted on 12/10/2016 6:30:08 AM PST by Kaslin
President-elect Donald Trump, still weeks away from the Oval Office, is already carrying out one of his campaign promises to make America prosperous again. First Ford Motor Company, now most recently Carrier, both agreeing to keep their factories in the US rather than outsourcing to foreign countries.
Carrier is based in Indiana, where VP-elect Mike Pence currently serves as governor. The deal will provide $7 million in incentives to Carrier in exchange for their keeping approximately 1100 jobs in Indiana.
Is this a good deal for America? Or just more of the cronyism which Trump railed against during his campaign?
The Wall Street Journal doesn’t like the deal, but they don’t like Donald Trump either and were against his candidacy. Neither does Trump ally Sarah Palin who denounced the deal as another case of “crony capitalism.” Clearly this move is not part of the Beltway playbook, and understandably, media and political elites are not impressed.
But Carrier employees are delighted, calling it a “victory for the little people.” The working class schlubs in flyover country who voted for Trump despite being called racist, sexist and a bunch of other names by those same media and political elites.
Why should the political class be surprised? Trump has had his own playbook from the day he rode down the escalator inside Trump Tower to announce his run for president.
Is there precedent for a US President cutting a deal with a private corporation? How did those deals work out?
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Trump was wrong about one thing. I’m not tired of winning yet.
Last sentence in the article :
Kudos to Donald Trump for, not just picking cabinet members and overseeing his transition team, but rolling up his sleeves and getting to work even before assuming office. Keeping his promise to “make our country rich again, make our country great again.”
He hasn’t even been inaugurated yet!
Multiply those 1100 jobs by a factor of 3 to 5 to see the overall impact on the local Indy economy. And, depending on the ability of the local market to re-employ those who would have been terminated, factor in the social costs (everything from unemployment comp to food stamps to re-education to prepare them for new jobs, etc) and you start to get a handle on the total impact on the economy.
Loss of primary sector jobs like manufacturing have this multiplier effect because the factory represents an inflow of money into the local economy that is then spent over and over again. This is why I have no interest in academic arguments about “crony capitialism” and the merits or demerits of incentives. They are as pointless as arguing over the ethics of a tourniquet when a person is bleeding to death.
What “Libertarians” and “Moment Conservatives” are actually advocating is a set of Economic Rules of Engagement for the US Economy even more restrictive then the current Obama ROE for the US Military.
In both cases it is an attempt to impose dogmatic ideological theories on the real world with no thought at all for outcomes and consequences.
See item “G” in the Keynes Theory from the depression.
Despite the velocity of money to different changes and taxes per each changed in taxes, the costs of school taxes, school free meals, food stamp, Sect 8, free daycare, medical services, income taxes, income taxes, SS lack of savings, public transportation, etc.
I’ve asked this question several times here without an answer. So I’ll ask it again. What special incentives did Trump offer Carrier to keep jobs in the US? The article stated that tax breaks were from the State of Indiana. If anything it appears Trump used threats of tariffs and not cozy cronyism.
So where are the special insider deals?
The question is irrelevant. Any insider deal struck has to be juxtaposition against the current environment of almost nil import tariffs which facilitates global labor arbitrage. To me this flies in the face of common sense and is an unnatural, unsustainable environment for a nation devolving economically and de industrializing. The crony capitalism you seek to find is festering on K Street and not at the office the President elect.
Marx wrote about the damage of "Free Trade" 150 years ago and how it hastened socialism's rise. Lenin called them "useful idiots". God please save us form the economic zealot state-less ideologues.
Trump has been acting more presidential in the last 4 weeks than Obama did over the last 8 years. It a joy to behold.
My understanding is that Trump did not offer Carrier special incentives to stay, the state of Indiana did. That is something states do all the time, Nevada gives incentives to businesses to come here with pretty good success.
Trump explained to Carrier what his tax plan is and how that would benefit Carrier vs a tariff on products being charged if they were manufactured out of this country.
juxtaposition = juxtapositioned
So where are the special insider deals?
Perhaps the biggest motivator was that he's not Obama. Seriously though, working to reduce stifling regulations in this country would go a long way to retaining manufacturing operations within the US. He made the correct choice for head of EPA, and that alone signals an end to the unjustified environmental rules that Obama's thugs have created these last several years.
In other words, what he's offering is to stop chasing business out of the US. That's a pretty big incentive in itself.
Palin said no such thing!
In her article about crony capitalism she said we don’t know the details of this deal, and so can not judge it.
The question is hardly irrelevant. Either Trumps offered targeted incentives, or he didn’t. I’ve yet to see any evidence that he did, yet he is criticized for doing so.
Maybe I should care but I don’t care what tactics Trump uses to combat the UniParty™, K Street and offshoring. Whatever it takes.
Trump talked with Carrier and did not have the power to actually do anything for them at the moment - Indiana opted to offer them the tax breaks as a further enticement. Carrier is well established and profitable w/o government help.
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