You could feel this coming in the air. Asheville City Council has on its consent agenda consideration of Project X (1, 2). The county has already held mock public hearings to ask the public what they thought about giving $18 million in incentives to an existing business that apparently has made such strides in impressing locals, it is insisting us weasels not know its identity until our fearless leaders have signed the documents. Thus, taxpayer dollars will be committed to pad the books of a company that does not want to do business with conventional, private-sector lenders. Maybe its credit is just too bad to go that route. Are we supposed to consult a psychic?
So, hopefully by now you know corporate welfare is like all other redistributions that deliver a competitive advantage to underperformers. If you still do not dig, it is a means of giving companies that can’t sell their products at sufficient profit to sustain corporate growth, enough money so they can push their junk, shoddy customer service, or boycotted business practices on the consumer anyway. It may mean putting the careful craftsman out of a job because the masses would rather buy two cheap subsidized products for the price of one honestly made.
It is additionally a means of further ruining banks. As government steals business from them because it is bigger and can offer better terms and interest rates, private banks have to recover what they’re losing on the big guys by jacking up fees on the little guys – or go out of business. Regulators know this and will keep tightening the thumbscrews. But I digress.
I want to talk about the stoogery of holding a “public hearing” on a company about which the public can know nothing. Since losing my ideal job when my honorable boss of fifteen or so years died, I have worked for a number of bosses in the area. I am left half wondering if Project X has anything to do with the sleazy corporate pirates for whom I once worked, who rather than producing and diversifying sought to stay in business with lawsuits and political favor. Such entities do exist outside of sci-fi novels.
The fact is, the public won’t know if they’re feeding the flame of a vile corporate monster, and the government bodies that are holding the mock public hearings won’t know either. All they know is the personable schmoozer-upper side of the lobbyists. If there is a dark side some whistleblowers out here could share, they don’t care. They just want to give money on the promise of creating those second jobs you’re going to need when they raise your taxes to pay for the job creation. Ain’t gummint grand.
