I feel like I write this same thing over and over. Another corporate welfare announcement, this time in Burlington. CS Carolina, a company that manufactures yarn, is adding 42 jobs to the 49 it already has there. That’s a significant increase, and I’m happy about the growth. I’m glad that 42 more people will be making, on average, $36,700 or so that they can use to support their families. I’m pleased to see that large, international companies are choosing to locate in North Carolina.
But I’m struggling with the idea that CS Carolina, which is investing $9.8 million over the next three years in technology and machinery at that Burlington facility, just has to have $85,000 from taxpayers to make their investment viable. It’s like saying, “I’d really love to buy that $100 pair of shoes, but I can’t afford it unless somebody can spot me $0.87.”
It’s not that CS Carolina needs the money. It’s that we’ve created an environment in which we hand out these grants to everyone who comes knocking. We’ve done it enough that any company locating in North Carolina thinks they’re bound to get a bit of cash themselves. So they ask, and we give. It’s $85,000, which isn’t huge money, but when it’s repeated over and over and over, it adds up.
Companies invest in order to grow. That’s how business works. And it’s how business should work. Instead, we’ve created an expectation that any job creation has a good chance of being met with some sort of financial reward from taxpayers. This has to stop.
