Good Jobs First Subsidy News
BY David Dayen, New Republic
As Amazon builds up its distribution network, it’s hit on a trick long practiced by the likes of Walmart: using the federal government to help pay its workers. A new study by Policy Matters Ohio found that more than 700 Amazon employees receive food stamps, or more than 10 percent of the tech giant’s 6,000-strong workforce in the state. Some of those recipients may be part-time help, but the fact that they need federal aid to survive suggests that they would be happy to work more. “Why is this giant, successful company offering such limited pay and hours of work that many of its workers need help buying food?” asked Zach Schiller, research director at Policy Matters.
By Rebekah Allen, The Advocate
Story Highlights
- Exxon Mobil, has gradually lost some 1,900 jobs in East Baton Rouge Parish, while receiving tax cuts worth almost $700 million over 20 years.
- The industrial tax exemption program has for years had no job requirement, and many companies have self reported job losses as they were allowed to forego millions of dollars in tax payments to local governments
By Greg LeRoy in City Lab
Amazon’s stunning announcement that it will build a second headquarters that could eventually employ 50,000 has triggered a frantic bidding war that may see the company win billions of dollars in tax incentives and other subsidies. But it’s the third such episode in three months. Wisconsin enacted a $3 billion subsidy deal for Foxconn and the State of Iowa with a Des Moines suburb awarded $213 million to Apple.
By Greg LeRoy, Fast Company
The biggest jobs deal yet to be announced during the new presidential administration exemplifies everything that’s wrong with our nation’s economic development system.
The tone was giddy as President Donald Trump himself headlined a July 26 White House event to announce that Taiwanese electronics maker Foxconn will build a large new plant in southeastern Wisconsin. Warming up the crowd were Foxconn chairman Terry Gou, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, and House Speaker Paul Ryan, in whose Congressional District the plant will likely reside.
By Greg LeRoy, CNBC
Then-candidate Donald Trump made American jobs a hyper-politicized issue, and even though unemployment is low, it's still big news when Carrier lays off workers in Indiana or when Taiwanese electronics giant Foxconn eyes Midwestern states to possibly create thousands of new jobs.
States and localities spend aggressively to lure private investment: one academic study estimated $70 billion per year — and that was before the Great Recession prompted some governors and mayors to double down on tax-break offers.