It’s a truism to say that all people make history, but not in conditions of their own choosing: Admittedly and sadly, the local boosterism of the pre-Trump years is now in retrospect worse than one might have initially believed: across America boosters who peddled false descriptions & junk solutions during the economic hardship of the…
WEDC
Bad Ideas, Boosterism, CDA, Economics, Economy, Foxconn, Government Spending, Local Government, Politics, WEDC
Market-Hating Republicans Have Been a Local Problem for Years
by JOHN ADAMS •
George Will, writing in the Washington Post, observes that Josh Hawley sounds like he has far too much faith in government: The sails of [Republican] Sen. Josh Hawley’s political skiff are filled with winds gusting from the right. They come from conservatives who think that an array of — perhaps most of — America’s social injuries,…
America, Bad Ideas, CDA, Economics, Economy, Gov. Walker, Government Spending, Local Government, State Government, WEDC, Wisconsin
But, but, but…we were promised growth, growth, growth!
by JOHN ADAMS •
Locally, statewide, and nationally, Trump & those who flacked his tax bill, and those who also pushed corporate welfare schemes (Foxconn, WEDC, Whitewater CDA), promised growth, growth, growth! How odd that these men — politicians, movers-and-shakers, developers, landlords, and public relations types — seem to have missed the mark: The World Bank sees U.S. growth stumbling from…
Bad Ideas, CDA, Economics, Economy, Foxconn, Government Spending, WEDC
Journal Sentinel’s Rick Romell Reports the Obvious about Foxconn Project
by JOHN ADAMS •
Over at the Journal Sentinel, business reporter Rick Romell reports that More signs emerge that the pace of Foxconn’s Wisconsin project is falling short of expectations. Honest to goodness – there have been years of reports, and years of analyses, that made clear to any reasonable person that this project was destined for failure. Anyone and…
CDA, Economics, Foxconn, Government Spending, WEDC, Wisconsin
Foxconn Notices the Noticeable
by JOHN ADAMS •
Two recent stories about Foxconn show how that project is, as Willy Shih of Harvard Business School aptly observed, only a state visit project (‘a high-profile way to earn some serious good will and political capital. But as Foxconn worked through the details, I suspect they were having trouble figuring out how to make economic…
CDA, Economics, Economy, Foxconn, Government Spending, WEDC, Wisconsin
Foxconn: State of Wisconsin Demands Accountability, Foreign Corporation Stalls
by JOHN ADAMS •
There’s a significant new development in the Foxconn project: the state has told the Taiwanese corporation it’s presently no longer eligible for tax credits. Over at The Verge, a national technology publication, there’s an excellent, detailed story about Foxconn’s serial excuses to receive the public money or credits it wants regardless of performance. In an…
CDA, Economics, Economy, Foxconn, Government Spending, WEDC, Wisconsin
Foxconn: Worse Than Nothing
by JOHN ADAMS •
Below are the abstract and full study from George Mason University on The Economics of a Targeted Economic Development Subsidy (examining the Foxconn deal in Wisconsin). There’s much to consider in this work, for the Foxconn project, and by reasonable extension to other government-targeted business subsidies. Abstract: In an effort to spur economic growth and…
Babbittry, Bad Ideas, CDA, Comedy, Corporate Welfare, Development, Foxconn, Government Spending, Local Government, Mendacity, State Capitalism, State Government, WEDC, Wisconsin
Foxconn: ‘Innovation Centers’ Gone in a Puff of Smoke
by JOHN ADAMS •
Trump insisted Foxconn in Wisconsin would be the eighth wonder of the world, and smarmy development men in places like Whitewater spoke about how much would come of the project, but in a puff of smoke that project’s ‘innovation centers’ are gone. Nick Statt reports Foxconn finally admits its empty Wisconsin ‘innovation centers’ aren’t being…
CDA, Corporate Welfare, Development, Foxconn, Government Spending, State Capitalism, That Which Paved the Way, Trump, WEDC, Wisconsin
Foxconn on the Same Day: Yes…um, just kidding, we mean no
by JOHN ADAMS •
One reads that in the course of a single day, Foxconn changed its plans for a major building at its Wisconsin site. Corrine Hess reports In A Day, Foxconn Changes Course, Plans To Build Different Mount Pleasant Building: This flashy building? Sorry, Wisconsin, you’re not getting this. Illustration via Mount Pleasant Development Dept. Foxconn’s plans to build a…
CDA, Economy, Trump, WEDC, Wisconsin
Trumpism Brings Economic Decline
by JOHN ADAMS •
It was supposed to be jobs, jobs, jobs for the WEDC and miniature versions of it like the Whitewater Community Development Authority. Gosh darn it, the former chairman of the Whitewater CDA even thanked (in person!) multimillionaire gerrymandered congressman F. James Sensenbrenner for part of the Trump tax bill. And yet, and yet, one reads…
Bad Ideas, CDA, Corporate Welfare, Foxconn, Government Spending, State Capitalism, WEDC, Wisconsin
Foxconn: First In, Now Out
by JOHN ADAMS •
One reads that Christopher ‘Tank’ Murdoch, the first Wisconsin resident hired by Foxconn, has left the company: Christopher “Tank” Murdoch, the first Wisconsin resident hired by Foxconn Technology Group and an honored figure at last year’s groundbreaking for the firm’s planned flat-screen factory, has left the company. In a brief interview, Murdoch said he left…
Bad Ideas, CDA, Corporate Welfare, Development, Foxconn, Government Spending, Mendacity, That Which Paved the Way, UW Madison, WEDC
Be Patient, UW-Madison: Only $99,300,000.00 to Go!
by JOHN ADAMS •
If a group invited a guest speaker who said the world was flat, then that group would be rightly discarded as a credible policy advocate. In Whitewater and other towns, crony-capitalist groups of different sizes proudly declared the Foxconn project a boon for Wisconsin. (Trump, himself, declared it a boon for the whole planet: “the…
Bad Ideas, CDA, Corporate Welfare, Development, Foxconn, Government Spending, Local Government, State Capitalism, State Government, That Which Paved the Way, WEDC, Wisconsin
Foxconn: Hey, Wisconsin, How About an Airport-Coffee Robot?
by JOHN ADAMS •
In Whitewater, there’s a top-notch think tank right-wing landlord’s business group that flacked Foxconn both privately and through that group’s sway over the Whitewater Community Development Authority. The group invited a state operative to spin Foxconn as a tech city of gold, and at the Whitewater CDA one could hear fantastic tales of high-tech wonders…
Bad Ideas, CDA, Corporate Welfare, Development, Economy, Foxconn, Government Spending, State Capitalism, State Government, That Which Paved the Way, Trump, Water, WEDC, WGTB, WHEN GREEN TURNS BROWN, Wisconsin
It Shouldn’t
by JOHN ADAMS •
Anna Clark (author of The Poisoned City: Flint’s Water and the American Urban Tragedy) asks Why should Wisconsin drain Lake Michigan for Foxconn?: The Great Lakes — five inland seas holding one-fifth of all the fresh water on Earth — are vast, but they are not limitless. So it is alarming that Wisconsin intends to send…
