Your Tax Dollars at Work!

[mrplunkey]

I won't say which state we are dealing with, or which industry -- other than to say we're doing a project in a renewable, green-friendly energy project in the US. It's an group of very conservative, "mean-spirited" republicans even though it's a highly eco-friendly investment.

So we get marched into a US Senator's office (he's an entrenched Democrat) because he wants us to meet some local union representitives. Here's the offer:

1) They expand their "enterprise zone" to cover our plant. It would yield $30M in tax breaks over time (NPV would be around $21M)

2) They give us $5M of federally-earmarked money to encourage economic development.

3) They expedite all of our EPA permits, perhaps accelerating our air permit 3-4 months (50%+ improvement)

And the catch? We have to agree to use all union labor. It's a $130M project, and they estimated that union labor would "only" increase the cost of the project by 20%. So guess what that comes out to? You guessed it... $26M dollars.

So what's the net result? Our new-found senator friend (again, a democrat) explains that if we'll transfer $26M to unions, they'll make us "whole" using state and federal taxpayer money. Really the only advantage to us is we'll get all our permits in half the time or less.

Sad, isn't it?

 

[WODIN]

Boo fuckin hoo.

Sad how?

You are robbing peter to pay paul either way.

 

[Longhorn85]

"You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours"

 

[mrplunkey]

Boo fuckin hoo.

Sad how?

You are robbing peter to pay paul either way.

My guess is we'll wait on the permits -- fuck robbing peter *or* paul. They don't know the lead time on one of our key components is 72 weeks.

And its sad because taxpayer money is being diverted to unions. People work hard for their money and having some of it shuffled off to criminal organizations is a shame.

 

[mrplunkey]

"You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours"

The democratic senator even joked about it... he said "have you ever seen the old Monty Python show? You know, wink wink nudge nudge?".

To him it was just a funny joke interjected into business as usual.

 

[WODIN]

The democratic senator even joked about it... he said "have you ever seen the old Monty Python show? You know, wink wink nudge nudge?".

To him it was just a funny joke interjected into business as usual.

OMG you think Republican Senators stand on principle?

LOL!!!

 

[mrplunkey]

OMG you think Republican Senators stand on principle?

LOL!!!

No, I actually think that there are both good and bad apples on both sides of the isle.

I've just seen enough crap from people like you who select an isolated republican incident and generalize it to apply to all Republicans. Using logic you've employed in the past we now have to assume that all democratic senators are in unions' back pockets.

P.S. And in this situation, the republicans in the room were standing on principle. They were pushing for permits on a very green-friendly project (greenhouse gas-neutral renewable fuel -- go figure!). It was the democrats threatening to hold their permits back if they didn't play ball.