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[Editorial] Bring Development to Earth

March 10, 2010

Tea-partiers and fiscal conservatives make a lot of noise about how much citizens pay in taxes—income, property, sales and so forth—decrying any effort toward increased spending on health care or social programs. It's a black-and-white world to these folks, where the only option for lowering taxes is lowering spending and vice versa.

Economics are more complex than that. Many parts of the conversation are missing, including how to shift expenses from one type of activity, such as federal defense expenditures, to another, like health care or public education. Our collective tax burden is skewed heavily toward corporations, with even the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that corporations have the same rights as individuals.

When we value corporations over people, huge amounts of taxpayer money simply slip through the economic cracks, landing in the pockets of corporate shareholders and Wall Street middlemen. We seem to have decided that this behavior is OK, bailing out multinationals at the expense of the American people.

Corporations are taking America by the short and curlies. With unemployment in double digits, when a big company wants to expand, they have their choice of states to expand into, playing off tax incentives from one against the other. And when a developer wants to build out his property, he has his choice of government-sponsored financing.

But virtually all of the great deals our city, state and federal government hand out have downsides, and all the downsides affect taxpayers—and not necessarily in a good way.

In this issue, in her new eco-devo column, Ronni Mott investigates one type of popular financing vehicle for developers: tax increment financing. In parallel to the glory days of creative financing for mortgage holders, TIFs became golden geese for developers all over the country. But like the interesting mortgage schemes that collapsed the housing market, taxpayers are finding that TIFs aren't the panacea some developers promised, either.

Cities, counties and states all over the country now find themselves unable to provide services to their constituents, partly because they are indebted to developers through TIF bonds. Like the mortgage bubble and the credit bubble, the concept of "buy now, pay later" seems too good to pass up in a booming economy. The problem, of course, is that economies don't always boom, and post-boom we still have bills to pay. For TIFs, those bills can extend for up to 40 years, passing development debt on to our children.

We need to come to our senses about economic development, remembering that all that glitters isn't gold. Let's not mortgage our kids future for the sake of pretty pictures and high-falutin' promises.

posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 03/10/10 at 03:52 PM. [printer version] Share |

COMMENTS

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Feb 08, 2012 | 01:26 PM
Want Medicaid? Ditch the Vanity Plate
Brian C Johnson: The courts will not allow the state to drug test Medicaid recipients, so why waste money and effort on it? How exactly are single mothers--who make up the majority ...

Feb 08, 2012 | 01:19 PM
[Kamikaze] 'I'm No Token'
Duan C.: Since you guys have turned the thread into a discussion of politics. A while back during one of our meetings we discussed a coming up with a grading system for our elected officials ...

Feb 08, 2012 | 01:06 PM
Want Medicaid? Ditch the Vanity Plate
Ronni_Mott: Republican conservatives are truly confusing. Aren't they the ones who want less government regulation? I suppose that only counts if its regulating things on their ...

Feb 08, 2012 | 12:35 PM
[Kamikaze] 'I'm No Token'
Walt: Renaldo/Blackwatch you have been simply marvelous in your insight and truth telling on this piece. So glad you're back. I thought we had lost you since I didn't see your posts for so ...

Feb 08, 2012 | 12:22 PM
[Editor's Note] Aloha, Jackson
DonnaLadd: Whoops. On second reference in the above column, I said "Air Force caption" instead of Army captain. I've corrected it above.

Feb 08, 2012 | 12:12 PM
Want Medicaid? Ditch the Vanity Plate
Laurie Bertram Roberts: I will say what I said before how does he even know how someone paid for that $30 tag. It could've been a gift they may have used their tax check because ...

Feb 08, 2012 | 11:43 AM
[Kamikaze] 'I'm No Token'
DonnaLadd: Of course, people learn at different speeds; I certainly didn't learn what I know now about writing and journalism craft until I was nearly 40 (of course, that had to do as much as ...

Feb 08, 2012 | 09:56 AM
[Kamikaze] 'I'm No Token'
Kamikaze: Kudos to you and to your Prof. Cant take anything from ya. But the "problem" with the craft around here (and a LOT of things) is that eveyone considers themselves an authority. I ...

Feb 08, 2012 | 09:19 AM
[Kamikaze] 'I'm No Token'
DonnaLadd: I don't want to derail this great thread with journalism lessons, but I'll answer Brad quickly about the problems with yes-or-no questions: Sometimes you can get lucky and get a ...

Feb 08, 2012 | 05:33 AM
[Kamikaze] 'I'm No Token'
Renaldo Bryant: @Duan In my post about corporate America, I noted that social justice and equity must be the only context under which interactions and contestations must take place. Simply ...

Feb 07, 2012 | 04:41 PM
[Kamikaze] 'I'm No Token'
Kamikaze: Well, Donna, as a "good" journalist. In my day..a DAMN good one. Ive gotten plenty of broader answers by follwing up with a "why" or "why not". and honestly the WHY of Kenny Stokes ...

Feb 07, 2012 | 04:14 PM
[Kamikaze] 'I'm No Token'
Duan C.: "Also, transforming Jxn has to be a metro concern, not just a Jxn proper concern. White Flight and residential segregation must be addressed......In the Jxn metro area, they don’t ...

Feb 07, 2012 | 03:31 PM
[Kamikaze] 'I'm No Token'
DonnaLadd: No, yes-or-no questions draw completely different kinds of answers, and usually empty sound bites, thus derailing the possibility of getting an intelligent answer. Good journalists ...

Feb 07, 2012 | 03:18 PM
[Kamikaze] 'I'm No Token'
Kamikaze: Well, a why or why not follow up would take it out of the "yes or no" I think. I dont think Ward 3 needs another councilperson with a "career politician" mentality. The spectre of ...

Feb 07, 2012 | 03:01 PM
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DonnaLadd: I'm not interested in term-limit questions, or getting anyone to pledge to them), and I try to never ask a yes-or-no question, but the other ones look good. Thanks to both of you. ...

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[Editorial] Bring Development to Earth

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