@TedF. I’d suggest you talk to some of North Carolina’s economic recruiters and let them tell you directly how ‘helpful’ NC’s GOP policies have been in recruiting businesses since 2010. It was an eye opening and disturbing discussion when I talked with them.
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I wouldn’t say it’s thanks to the GOP, but it’s definitely true that (compared to the rest of the country) lower taxes are a big help to putting us on the map. North Carolina is a fundamentally purple state, and it obviously can’t be that way without significant input from libertarian stakeholders.
Keyword: libertarian. I think this is an important distinction that lets both @UncleJesse and you/@KenAA be right.
Conservative/liberal politics like Ken is talking about and libertarian/managed economies live together in pairs in American political ideology, but they’re not inherently one and the same. Lower taxes, corporate incentives pouring gas over the fire of a free(?) market, pushing for less government involvement in people’s daily life etc. are dictionary-“libertarian”. Without a doubt, policies like these are pretty damn attractive for businesses.
But this isn’t inherently equal to the Republican Party. Social conservatism is a (related, but) separate and distinct set of ideas -and likewise, the Republican Party can claim to stand for both, but be its own, independent actor.
It’s the GOP (in their role as the ruling party in the HB2 debacle) that became the face and caricature of North Carolina. Whether you like it or not, not many people think about pure ideas and abstracts -but people like to put faces and cartoon villains/heroes to what’s going on. (I mean, doesn’t that just make life easier??)
I think this is what Jesse was trying to get at. The GOP itself and its policies can have contradicting effects on how NC stands with the world -because they aren’t one and the same.
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Everything I read says pretty much otherwise… this is just one of many that I googled. Hard to find any real negative news about the state of the state of North Carolina.
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& they are quite happy about discouraging workers coming in from California or the northeast, economy be damned. The GOP-led Legislature is probably the most extreme (re: environmental, redistictricting, LQBTQ issues) in the US. They don’t match a purple state.
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“The GOP itself and its policies can have contradicting effects on how NC stands with the world -because they aren’t one and the same”
Which is exactly what I said. Viewing one negative aspect like the HB2 and refusing to acknowledge those positives aspects is what I find at fault. Every party who controls this state does positive and negative things that affect the economy and our businesses prospects. Raising taxes and increased regulations for example generally are not viewed as positives for businesses and yet those things happen regularly.
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I think a great deal of it comes down to how alphabet companies rate the quality of life here as measured through the eyes of their employees.
This young writer explains why he’s “done” with our area. In his words, "Simply put, Raleigh is pretty boring. I’m constantly looking online and in person, searching for something new and exciting to do in the Raleigh area, something I missed, but most times there’s nothing. The usual answer to my search is, “what about our wonderful parks? Or maybe try a museum or a brewery.”
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Fascinating. A kid wants to move out of his home town to get cultured.
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Experience is the best teacher and he’ll be back…
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Blockquote Even when accounting for differences in density and distance to the beach in order to compare Raleigh (pop: 485,679, density: 1,293/km²) to more similar cities like Atlanta (pop: 501,178, density: 1,450/km²) and Colorado Springs (pop: 493,799 density: 979/km²), Raleigh still lacks anything close to the cultural richness of either.
The cultural richness of Colorado Springs? Sure thing, dude.
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Corporate incentives are 100% NOT libertarian. I’m not interested in the discussion about what does or does not dissuade companies but true libertarians (mind you I am not one) want no government involvement and are very very against active recruitment incentives.
Whether it’s been Dems or Repubs, NC has been a very financially welcoming state for decades.
Frankly, most of NC’s growth and shift to first tier industries happened during Dem control of the government.
That said, the point is not whether or not the Dems or Repubs are in charge, it’s about how the Repubs, with one fell swoop, severely damaged the reputation of the state in the eyes of next gen industry. I know that it’s a hard pill to swallow for some, but it’s true. It’s also not like the state wasn’t warned by industry that this would happen either. It was promised by many industry leaders that they would pull out/boycott/shelve plans for expansion, etc. if it happened. Guess what? They did. They also continue to do so. In my opinion, if the Republicans didn’t want to continually hear how they economically crippled NC’s future, they shouldn’t have passed HB2.
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“if the Republicans didn’t want to continually hear how they economically crippled NC’s future”
Except it’s not crippled. Not even remotely. And of course most of the shift to first tier industries happened during Dem control because they have ALWAYS been in control until fairly recently. Don’t worry the Dems will get it back eventually.
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Look you can be a republican state and still attract west coast tech companies like Texas and Tennessee clearly demonstrated. And sure it is a multitude of factors that flow into an expansion decision beyond politics. Every company likes incentives and low taxes so that works best in a GOP state in today’s times. Also the current’s administration tax cuts were a big factor in the recent investing spree domestically.
However, the big tech companies also have to balance public opinion and culture in these decisions. HB2 was a disaster for NC and now in 2018 knowingly Amazon, Apple, etc. are expanding and have Raleigh on shortlist it is imprudent to say the least to throw topics like Voter ID on the ballot. I know Voter ID is the case in other states and I know it was democratic decision but timing was terrible and cost us. Did you see any backlash for Apple deciding to double down on Austin or Amazon in selecting Nashville? No but both companies interest in NC resulted in backlash by Color of Change and Human Rights Campaign.
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We don’t know the full damage to our future, because the future hasn’t happened yet.
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It’s not exactly honeycrisp apples to honeycrisp apples, but current gov. of Texas Greg Abbot won reelection by over 1m votes defeating an openly gay candidate after proposing a bathroom bill very similar to HB2. The bill did not pass and he dropped it as a priority to prevent wedge issue during election, but the guy who once made transgender bathroom bill a priority won last year. We ousted our gov. in response to HB2, Texas kept theirs even though the guy fought for it at one point.
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The liberal positions still refuse to site how NYC flubbed up their Amazon deal. A total catastrophe. All done by a fully Democrat line up. Yet they still cling to the NC bathroom bill but can find no fault in far bigger policy disasters that their side ‘owns’. My point is lots of things can send these deals south.
Southern states are still owning the northern, more progressive states in attracting tech projects. We can see from the NYC/Amazon disaster that it’s not simply a democratic vs republican issue. So advocates who claim otherwise are being overly partisan. The issues that influence these projects are more diverse, such as tax policy, incentives, location, and local synergy. It seems the NYC failure can be most blamed on the synergy (too much division).
Can the Triangle improve on these issues to stay in front of the pack? I figure we all agree that a train line would help. Also increasing the offerings at Wake Tech would entice more high end projects. Can we become more cool like Portland and Austin? We’re making strides there as downtown Raleigh and Durham become more populated and lively. What else will put us over the top?
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“We don’t know the full damage to our future, because the future hasn’t happened yet.”
Fair enough. If I can’t say there is very little damage if any at all, then by your logic others also cannot say that we are crippled or damaged either by HB2. Because the future hasn’t happened yet.
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Ken, you are correct Amazon HQ2 decision is a big blow for NY. Amazon was facing unexpected fierce backlash from lawmakers, progressive activists and union leaders.
It is not a question of political sides - public perception and backlash are playing into these decisions. In NY as in NC
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Frankly, NYC doesn’t need Amazon. NYC doesn’t need to beg for high paying jobs.
I’m certain that this would have played out differently if it were proposed for a smaller city upstate.
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Personally I am glad NY pushed back on Amazon. Corporate welfare to attract jobs and pittting states and cities against one another to lure a promise of jobs is a big problem in this country.
This will never happen, but the federal government should step in and tax all local and state incentives at 100% to even the playing field.
I have no problem recruiting companies based on our culture, climate, tech work force etc. but offering millions in tax breaks for some of the wealthiest companies in the world to bring jobs to your area is absurd.
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