The ‘Innovation Express’ – even less efficient, more costly, and more unjustified as crony capitalism than anyone might have thought! There are two stories at the Janesville Gazette that do their damnedest to justify federal, state, and local subsidies ($83,005) for a bus that benefits principally a few workers from multi-billion-dollar Generac, but even cheerleading…
Corporate Welfare
The
Business, City, Corporate Welfare, Government Spending
The Generac Bus and Bottom-Shelf Messaging
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
More on a bad deal for taxpayers, but a bargain at their expense for one big corporation. I posted recently on addled messaging about the Generac bus from a weekly report of Whitewater’s city manager dated 5.11.12. Last Friday, 5.18.12, there was another announcement about the bus. That new announcement is really an admission of…
Business, City, Corporate Welfare, Government Spending, Taxes/Taxation
A little consistency would be in order
by JOHN ADAMS • • Comments
Around two years ago, the Wisconsin Department of Revenue changed the method by which municipalities valued private properties. The state concluded — correctly — that municipalities were often over-valuing and thus over-taxing private properties. For businesses, a correct, lower assessment meant less in taxes; for municipalities, an over-valuation was useful to extract as much in…
Business, City, Corporate Welfare
A Local Flavor of Crony Capitalism
by JOHN ADAMS • • 6 Comments
Multi-city Generac, a large industrial concern, wants government money — federal, state, local — for a bus line to bring workers from the Janesville-Beloit area to its plant in Whitewater. The bus line’s really good for no one but Generac’s employees. The times for the proposed line are tailored not to community needs, but to…