Don’t look now, but the entire framework of North Carolina’s various corporate tax breaks and incentives is shot full of — shall we say — errors. But one example that illustrates the problem:
The Collins & Aikman case came to light in August when the Michigan-based firm said it planned to refile its tax returns for 2002 and 2003 to correct what it called “computational errors” leading to the $36 million mistake. Misplaced decimal points, a C&A spokesman said, caused the company to claim $37 million in credits when the real number should have been $493,222.
Huh? Yeah, decimal in the wrong place. Sure. Read the whole sad, scary thing here.
When states and localities do these kinds of deals, someone has to go back and verify the claims. As finding mistakes is in absolutely no one’s interest, least of all the government officials who put the deals together or the pols who create the programs, we wind up with “misplaced decimal points” all over the place.
