WRAL.com continues its series examining North Carolina’s web of corporate welfare schemes, in this article highlighting how taxpayer funds for corporate subsidies are heavily concentrated in the state’s most prosperous areas.
Data from the state Department of Commerce shows far more taxpayer money flows to the counties doing the best economically than those that are more needy. Since 2009, the state announced more than $514 million in grants for projects in these tier three counties – 80 percent of the total value of grants announced. Tier one counties claim only 10 percent of that value.
Included in the article is a refreshingly honest admission by former state commerce secretary Jim Fain:
“There’s a line people use that politicians just like to go cut ribbons. Well you’re damn right they do. Because if they didn’t, they wouldn’t get elected again,” Fain said.
Crony capitalism is first and foremost about the exercise of political power, and the self-interest of the political class. Any concern about the (completely unfounded) economic benefits of “economic incentives” is a mere afterthought.
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