A well-educated, highly productive workforce, access to markets and suppliers, sound infrastructure, and a high quality of life for employees are more important to corporate leaders than state taxes, according to numerous surveys, studies and popular rankings of “business friendly” states.
The above quote was made in a paper by the far-left Budget & Tax Center in April 2013. Left-wing statists (but I repeat myself) who stretch credulity in their attempt to oppose any tax relief for hard-working North Carolinians have repeatedly made such claims over the last several years. Tax rates don’t matter, and tax cuts don’t stimulate economic growth, they claim.
The latest article exemplifying the absurdity of these claims focuses on NC’s film incentives.
The second season of the TNT drama “Good Behavior” premieres Sunday and – in addition to being a dark and suspenseful crime/love story – it has the distinction of being the only scripted television series to have filmed in North Carolina this year.
That’s quite a difference from years past, when the state had a robust film tax credit program that lured major productions. In recent years, a number of television shows filmed in North Carolina – “Homeland,” “Sleepy Hollow,” “Under the Dome,” “Revolution,” “Banshee” and “Eastbound & Down,” to name a few. In addition, blockbuster films such as “The Hunger Games” and “Iron Man 3” filmed in the state.
The state legislature voted to end those credits after 2014, replacing the tax incentive program that paid out $80.7 million in 2014 with a one-year $10 million grant program. ….Industry spending in the state dropped in 2015 – to $111 million from $316 million in 2014. (emphasis added)
No change in infrastructure, the education level of the workforce, or quality of life. Just a higher tax burden, and poof, the film industry dried up in NC.
Sure, those other factors are important as well. But to pretend as the left does that taxes are basically a non-factor, and that tax cuts don’t stimulate investment and growth defies reality.
Gov. Cooper stated that “reinstating the state’s film tax rebate program as one of his goals while in office.” One can merely speculate how that would impact his re-election fundraising efforts in Hollywood. The left recognizes that lower tax burdens stimulate investment in the film production industry, but wants to pretend it doesn’t have the same impact on the economy as a whole. Just imagine the boost to NC’s economy if all businesses received the same tax credits as the film industry.
Curiously, when it comes to targeted tax credits and giveaways such as this one to Hollywood cronies, the left never seems to be up in arms about “starving the state of needed tax revenue.” Only when there is broad-based tax cuts that benefit the majority of working North Carolinians does the left concern itself with such things.
“Leftists” have no representation in North Carolina or the United States. The Democratic Party is not the ‘Left.’ Brian Balfour is intellectually dishonest. He uses the term, which replaced progressives, that replaced liberals, that replaced communists, as a form of Propaganda.
Another clear case of NC Civitas as a Marketing organization for their Masters, posing as an Academic Think Thank that cares about you.
Scott fashions himself as the arbiter of allowable words and definitions. Who is on the left? Are democrats on the right?
And yet again, I notice you go to lengths to avoid any of the actual points of the article.
NC Civitas is a Marketing organization for their masters, posing as an Academic Think Tank.
That is why your articles are not worth reading Brian. They are all political Propaganda. Everything the NCGOP does is good. Everything the NCDP does is bad.
The point of every article you write Brian is simple. NCGOP good, NCDP bad. It’s so one sided that it is laughable at best.
Scott,
Still can’t answer direct questions I see.
And if the articles are not worth reading, why do you comment on so many?