I've been trying to keep an open mind about the Mayo proposal. TIF is a quite a bit less objectionable when the funds are directed to public infrastructure rather than to private coffers. I probably wouldn't consider a parking facility for Mayo patients and employees public infrastructure, but I completely understand if Mayo expansion required new and better sidewalks and water & sewer lines. However, $500M seems way out of the ballpark for improvements like these.
The Mayo shouldn't have to pay the cost of a high speed rail line to Rochester, but I'm not sure TIF is a great way to pay for intercity train lines.
So, I've been a little skeptical about their proposal, but open-minded. However, when I hear
statements like these my first reaction is, go fuck yourself.
“We’re never going to leave Minnesota, and we don’t want to leave Minnesota,” Dr. John Noseworthy said in an interview at the National Press Club, where the CEO made a pitch for federal investment in health care and medical research. “But we’ve got to decide where we’re going to put the next $3 billion.”
“If they say yes, that’s great, we want to stay in Minnesota,” Noseworthy said. But, he cautioned, “If they say no, or you’re going to have to go for a bonding bill every year for the next 30 years, we’ll have to rethink about whether that’s the best use of our money.”
It's one thing for a business to make clear what they want from government to complement their plans. They are free to make requests. But once this request turns into lawyerly, smile-in-your-face-blackmail, this world-class-asset becomes part of the problem.
It was argued over in the Convention Hotel thread that it's reasonable for a business with positive externalities (increased tax receipts, tourist draw, and employed locals) to benefit from that economic activity in the form of subsidies. But that isn't how this is supposed to work. Businesses pay taxes to be part of civil society. They pay property taxes for the roads that take customers to their door, police and fire protection of their assets, and public schools to educate their employees. Unfortunately, an entitlement mentality has taken over this country's corporate elite. They expect the government should pay them to create a job that's really just incidental to their business.
Since only the corporate giants are able to offer the scale the politicians chase and the flexibility to play local governments against each other, the spoils go to the biggest. Small business is left to pay their own freight in a warped marketplace, and economic power is concentrated in ever fewer hands.
If you're doubting the scale of this problem, check out this
excellent NY Times article from a few months ago. For a quintessential example of the corrosive effect on communities, listen to this
NPR piece from a couple days ago.
After my little fit about Mayo's thinly-veiled blackmail, I'll return to looking at their proposal pragmatically. It's hardly the most egregious example of corporate welfare. The details I've seen are still fuzzy. I hope our state politicians take their request seriously and evaluate it fairly. But in general, Minnesota is going to be better off to focus on investing in a better state, improving the public commons, making our state a place people want to be and companies want to invest in. Let's leave the race to the bottom to parts of the county much more desperate than us.