14 ms·

Wisconsin’s $4.1B Foxconn factory boondoggle

210 points by gok 8y ago

kevin_b_er 8y ago
Money to corporations for lies about the jobs in order to win an election. I've seen this template too many times, this just might be the biggest one ever, however.
- ourmandave 8y ago
  I'm guessing the Amazon 2nd HQ deal will make Foxconn look like small potatoes.
  - Arnt 8y ago
    You're guessing it will involve much more than $315k/job?
    - kbenson 8y ago
      There's something to be said for absolute quantity/amount all on its own. The amount/job may be lower, but it might also be a higher percentage of overall state budget...
    - ourmandave 8y ago
      I don't know, but you should see the future tax revenue Chicago was willing to give up, and they're out of the running.
- jorblumesea 8y ago
  Why not? It's not like voters hold politicians accountable, nor do they even remember these incidents in the long term. We blindly vote along party lines regardless of performance. We get the politicians we deserve.
- Nasrudith 8y ago
  This approach is fundamentally one of doctrine and ignoring what actually attracts companies and it isn't even what companies say it is - those are usually bonuses they want on top of what they actually need. It isn't taxes but resources that can be used successfully which itself varies by businesses. If low tax environments were really what they lusted for above all else they would start buying up vast swathes of unincorporated land. Basically nobody except maybe corporate farmers and real estate developers are doing that. The good news is that desired resources vary. It could be mineral resources. It could be location. It could be the labor pool. Infrastructure is a large part of it along with the local labor pool or ability to host one satisfactorily.
  - kbenson 8y ago
    It totally makes sense to provide more direct incentives to the other end of the spectrum. What if Wisconsin could tell Foxconn that it's offering to forgive a portion of all student debt for engineering degrees in the colleges around the area? Or that it would reimburse citizens for technical learning courses or training programs for likely positions in the area? Or if Wisconsin was willing to forgive state income tax for Foxconn employees for a certain number of years (which seems to amount to between 5-6% of income)? All strategies that increase the attractiveness of the area by actually making the area a better resource pool over time, and in a way that helps citizens.
uxp100 8y ago
> In both cities, the company said it wanted to attract top talent from area universities. But Milwaukee, Green Bay, and Eau Claire are homes to some of the state’s lesser universities, and it was unclear why these graduates couldn’t simply drive down to the Racine plant to apply for jobs. What? Eau Claire is 260 miles away from Racine. Green Bay is 150 miles. An Eau Clare location can attract people who want to stay near Minneapolis. And the Downtown Milwaukee location is a more desirable place to work to Milwaukee metro residents than out in Sturtevant, home of that one Amtrak stop. You can't put a 4 square mile factory downtown, but I'm not sure why all your engineers have to work at the factory. Also, lesser universities? They mean not Madison. But if you're ruling out Madison (maybe they figure a Madison to Milwaukee commute is reasonable), they seem like good choices. Maybe La Crosse lost out to Eau Claire because of proximity to Minneapolis?
- HillaryBriss 8y ago
  OTOH, wouldn't FoxConn just hire any qualified person who applied from anywhere? they're not limited to UW grads or even Wisconsin residents.
  - bytematic 8y ago
    Tax breaks perhaps?
  - thrmsforbfast 8y ago
    1. That would destroy the whole point of the plant, which was to create jobs for down-on-their-luck Wisconsites. 2. If you're not from Wisconsin, why would you move to Wisconsin? There's nothing wrong with Milwaukee, BTW. Nice city. But there are dozens of other nice low-CoL cities in the USA, many with nicer weather and many still in the Midwest.
  - tfehring 8y ago
    Any qualified person who's willing to move to the Milwaukee area. If you're not from Wisconsin and you're willing to move out of state after graduating, of all the places you could move to, why on earth would you choose Milwaukee? I like Milwaukee, I went to UWM for undergrad, and I might have stuck around after graduating if the job market were better. But if I weren't from Wisconsin (and especially if I were from somewhere with a warmer climate), I don't think I'd even consider it.
stevecalifornia 8y ago
No matter what the content, I now find it hard to read articles where it feels like the author has a personal point to make. This is somewhere between news and opinion. Perhaps the author's explanation of the facts is correct-- or perhaps he is interpreting facts for his own personal views. It's hard to tell so I just end up not really putting much weight into the article.
- eropple 8y ago
  That seems ill-advised to me. Yeah, he has a bias. So does literally everyone else. The notion of unbiased news is 1) fiction, and 2) fiction that exists to support a status quo that may or may not be to the readers' liking or their best interests. An honest accounting of where one stands allows you to calibrate for it. Dishonest impartiality--and, for reals, it's all dishonest--robs you of that ability.
- nostromo 8y ago
  Vox (which owns The Verge) was explicitly created as a left/progressive news organization. The founders come from The Howard Dean campaign, Daily Kos, The American Prospect, etc. I'm not saying this disparingley, just to point out that they've always had an explicitly left point of view. I'm not exactly shocked that they dislike Scott Walker.
- ychen306 8y ago
  The article is fairly well-sourced. I am not saying this makes it unbiased; but if you are not-satisfied with the conclusion, you can verify the quotes and make up your own.
booleanbetrayal 8y ago
It's also pretty evident, by this article's caption picture, that none of these men had ever used a shovel before in their lives.
- kevin_thibedeau 8y ago
  Looks like they're too dainty to walk on bare dirt either. They have a specially paved strip of asphalt to stand on.
- mrfredward 8y ago
  Not to mention the shovels are golden and they are all wearing suits. It could just as well be a political cartoon about a new Gilded Age if it wasn't real life.
jtlienwis 8y ago
What I find funny is that Wisconsin already makes a large number of the components needed for LCD monitors, TVs etc. 3M in Menomene makes the difusers that spred the light in back of the screen. There is TTM in Chippewa Falls that makes pcb boards that are needed for the electronics. There are IC design houses and computer makers (Cray Computer and HP) that can design the electronics. Foxconn buys the equipment to make the LCDs from the Japanese (Nikon) and they hire the workers to run them. Why not just eliminate the middle man (Foxconn) and make our own? I'm not sure the cost would have been much more.
- Sephr 8y ago
  Newer LCD displays will forgo the diffuser for mini-LED FALD backlights.
Animats 8y ago
What a sucker of a governor. "But all the other subsidies, worth more than $1 billion, will be paid regardless of money invested or jobs created." (See also: most stadium deals.)
- bilbo0s 8y ago
  I'll just say that while I realize that Wisconsin is extremely corrupt, in looking around the nation I've started to get the feeling that most of the other states are likely as corrupt as ourselves. The difference is that in Wisconsin we, at least, still have people that get mad about it, and occasionally we even have mass protests. The main problem here, (and it's frustrating), but the main problem is that due to the way the system is structured, we can do nothing about all the corruption. I don't like always being on the national news because of the latest governmental thuggery, neither does anyone among my family and friends. (And I was born and raised in small town Wisconsin.) There's just so little the average person can do, so you just sit in Markesan, or Racine, or Independence, or LaCrosse or wherever and you just stew in your anger. Then it even gets thrown in your face on Hacker News.
  - bytematic 8y ago
    Fellow Wisconsinite here, what do you see as examples of corruption? All I see is Republican's dug in and using tactics such as voter suppression and corporate handouts. Is that what you mean?
    - bilbo0s 8y ago
      >All I see is Republican's dug in and using tactics such as voter suppression and corporate handouts. Is that what you mean?... Well, yeah, there's that. I guess I didn't even go into that stuff in my post on Wisconsin's corruption. (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18329653 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18329653) But really there's so much out and out criminal behavior that goes on here that I really don't think something like a really bad Foxconn deal should be entirely unexpected. If there's an opportunity to spend, 1 billion, 2 billion, 4 billion whatever in state tax dollars... I mean, yeah, in a place like Wisconsin, you have to pretty much expect that there are going to be some irregularities. It's just how things are done here.
Invictus0 8y ago
Is there any way for Wisconsin to walk back the deal? If Foxconn isn't building the plant they said they would, and aren't creating as many jobs as they said they would, surely there's some way to prevent the disbursement of the subsidy? On another note, I wonder what it will take for middle America to let go of the dream of well-paid manufacturing jobs. I understand the hope and allure, but it's plain that this ship has sailed long ago. Watching these snakeoil salesmen literally and financially strip-mine the country is just sad. I don't know that there is a good solution to the problem, as these states aren't really set up to sustain knowledge-based industries. How will they pivot into the 21st century? I can't help but think that 20 years from now, we will still just see more of the same.
- arcseco 8y ago
  >On another note, I wonder what it will take for middle America to let go of the dream of well-paid manufacturing jobs. I understand the hope and allure, but it's plain that this ship has sailed long ago. Liberalization of global markets has not had that long of a time to run its course. You speak so confidently that the status quo will run eternal. What is happening in middle America should be seen as pragmatism, the people of Wisconsin are beginning to accept their current predicament. They are accepting a leveling of environmental standards to foster competition with East Asia rather than choosing to go the way of the Dodo. Is this not what classical liberals dream of, a leveling of competition across boarders? So quickly the west is ready to externalize the cost of environmental pollution in the name of liberalization of markets but hypocritically don't appreciate the same leveling of standards domestically out of necessity. Perhaps the coasts should subsidize the cost of living in the mid-west to maintain the cost of keeping environmental standards well above those in developing countries. Please don't turn your nose up at people that are desperate to make a living and are willing to sacrifice a lot in order to do so.
  - thrmsforbfast 8y ago
    Except by now, even Foxconn has openly admitted that there aren't going to be tens of thousands of $60k+ manufacturing jobs. WI spent 4B+ on the "deregulated manufacturing hub" idea and it's still going to fail to materialize well-paying jobs for non-college-educated folks. This by Foxconn's own public admission. Furthermore, the attitude that "either you're a coastal elite or you believe in the future of well-paid manufacturing jobs" is extraordinarily presumptive. Has it occurred to you that some of us want "middle America to let go of the dream of well-paid manufacturing jobs" precisely because we are from/currently live in middle America, desperately want what's best for it, and believe manufacturing isn't going to provide that? By the way, why on earth do you believe the Midwest needs manufacturing for a robust economy? That assertion -- that the Midwest can't build a thriving information/services-based economy -- seems far more like "turning your nose up" at the Midwest than your parent's post! Frankly, whenever I encounter this mentality, I read it as: "oh yes, those [small-town] midwesterners, what could they ever do for society if they don't have assembly lines to work on."
bonestamp2 8y ago
> The LCD screens being made by Foxconn require benzene, chromium, cadmium, mercury, zinc, and copper ... The Walker administration had also exempted Foxconn from the state’s usual environmental rules, allowing it to discharge materials into wetlands... WTF? Wisconsin is a beautiful state with rich wetlands and farmland. Letting a Taiwanese* company fuck that up for 13,000 jobs that will never pay back the incentives makes no sense, other than a small tick on Walker's re-election campaign resume which he is now shying away from anyway. This project needs to be cleaned up or killed before it starts to literally kill people in Wisconsin.
- thrmsforbfast 8y ago
  A maximum of 13k jobs. They still get billions and carte blanc environmental waivers even if only a tenth of those materialize. Also worth noting that the average salaries required to get those subsidies have dropped substantially since the beginning of this process; we've gone from "lots of skilled jobs" to "mostly $15/hr factory labor". Totally predictable to those of us who know the difference between "iPhone factory" and "Apple HQ", but this was a huge source of confusion among my non-tech blue collar Wisconsin friends. They [1] really did think there would be six figure tech jobs available to anyone with a CC degree. [1] edit: here "they" refers to 10-15 specific people, and isn't intended to generalize to "all Wisconsites", although I do believe there's a demographic that's being intentionally deceived and who would change their opinions on Foxconn if someone sat them down and explained that "working in an LCD factory" is not a "tech job" in the sense of six figure salary with good benefits, and that if those "tech jobs" do come to Wisconsin via Foxconn it's going to be a relatively small number of them and most certainly won't go to people who are straight out of high school after 6 months in a fast-tracked community college program.
  - bilbo0s 8y ago
    >this was a huge source of confusion among my non-tech blue collar Wisconsin friends. They really did think there would be six figure tech jobs available to anyone with a CC degree.... That's unfair. Wisconsinites are not stupid. We knew what this deal meant for the most part. The issue is corruption. We have few effective methods of fighting it here in Wisconsin. I'm not trying to wuss out or anything, but there is a reality to life in a place like Wisconsin. Think of it this way, there is probably some percentage above which corruption becomes too ingrained, and you can't do anything about it anymore. Maybe that percentage is 10%? Maybe it's 20%? Whatever. But if a place reaches that tipping point, that's it. And I don't think that's unique to Wisconsin by the way. I think MOST states and municipalities would present the same issues if their tipping point number was reached. It just becomes very hard to do anything about what's going on around you.
duxup 8y ago
So frustrating to see politicians on the "conservative" side of things in the US who should be opposed to this on a fundamental level, jump into handing over taxpayer money, the environment, and such for what appears to be less and less. Also what is with Foxcon's constantly changing plans with all this? It doesn't seem like they have a coherent plan on what they wanted to do / want other than gather up taxpayer dollars... If Foxcon has no coherent plan, the deal should be off.
- sbuttgereit 8y ago
  Why would you be surprised or expect them to be opposed? I'll be honest, I think you misread what "conservatism" is really about... and I say this as someone that thought he knew it and considered himself to be a "conservative" for a long time. Their pitch is smaller government, but you shouldn't construe that to mean a non-interventionist government. They see a very active role for government in 1) foreign affairs; 2) economic activity; 3) social policy... in other words, quite a lot of intervention. The only real difference between the conservatives and the progressives are the goals of those interventions (somewhat) and the how up-front they are about their positions. Once realized that the pitch and the actual goals were saying contradictory things... I can tell you that I'm no conservative.
  - duxup 8y ago
    I'm not surprised.
  - amanaplanacanal 8y ago
    It's really hard to have legitimate political debate when you can't even find out what people's real political positions are. My gut feeling is that the blue team is more honest about telling you what they actually believe and want, but I might just be naive.
    - sbuttgereit 8y ago
      [edited: I didn't like pretty much my entire text; updated to be more clear about the same ideas] Team Red lies about what principles they hold; there are exceptions, like abortion, but on the whole they say they're for one thing when in fact they are largely about another. Team Blue is pretty up-front about their principles. For Team Blue rules much more by the ends justifying means. So they'll tell you what they're after generally, but will lie about/hide the details of what it takes to achieve the ends or the broader consequences of their goals that might not be readily apparent. Both of them want you to have an emotional response to their proposals or opposition than to try to have you respond rationally to facts. Lying or not, an emotional response is stronger, harder to dislodge, and avoids pesky details that complicate an otherwise perfectly painted, if not fully real, picture.
jorblumesea 8y ago
I really wish the Rust belt would give up their dream of recapturing a large manufacturing base and focus on educating their populace for the 21st century. Imagine if that subsidy money was used in education. It's pretty clear that mass manufacturing is a race to the bottom (China is now facing competition from Vietnam), and high tech manufacturing (Germany) will not provide the amount of jobs needed to offset the ones lost over the past 40 years. While manufacturing should always be a component of any mixed economy, many of those jobs are not coming back and we need to retool our workforce. A highly educated workforce is the best way out.
- cmrdporcupine 8y ago
  For that matter most of the rust belt states have very fertile soils and plenty of fresh water and historically were great temperate agriculture power houses before much of that agriculture moved to the year-round-climate cheap-labor zone of California. Now picture the world 20 years from now when drought and depleted aquifers make California not as viable for intense food production as it is now. Suddenly the east/northeast/midwest around the great lakes look pretty damn attractive.
- geodel 8y ago
  > Imagine if that subsidy money was used in education It is not the money that is lying around with government, ready to be spent. It is something that government could have collected if factories were built and they paid all the taxes. And I am not sure, they are getting built without squeezing governments on taxes.
qaq 8y ago
Too long to read is there actual breakdown of tax incentives vs actual $ state has to spend?
lewis500 8y ago
The subsidy ratio here is incredible. Alabama has used subsidies to lure automakers and other factories, but our incentives are peanuts compared to this. For example, we are getting a $1.7 billion Toyota-Mazda plant for $350 million in incentives, creating about 4k jobs. The state has a 4-5% income tax and 9-10% sales taxes, so I'd bet that, even if the 4k number is exaggerated, then the state and local govts will earn much of that money back within a few years (provided it doesn't create some pollution disaster).
simias 8y ago
The “AI 8K+5G” buzzword bonanza is marvelous. I'm surprised they haven't thrown cryptocurrencies and IoT in there for good measure. I'm also surprised to read that: >The Walker administration had also exempted Foxconn from the state’s usual environmental rules, allowing it to discharge materials into wetlands and reroute streams during construction and operation. The state also exempted the company from doing an Environmental Impact Statement. How is that even a legal possibility? The state's administration can just decide to suspend these rules on a case-by-case basis without any kind of supervision or accountability?
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- jpfed 8y ago
  >How is that even a legal possibility? Walker didn't do it unilaterally; the legislature passed a law to exempt Foxconn specifically. They are considering giving Kimberly-Clark a similar deal: https://madison.com/wsj/news/local/govt-and-politics/gop-lawmakers-call-extraordinary-session-on-foxconn-style-aid-package/article_9b94b4bc-0972-553d-8c6b-379cebbd1269.html https://madison.com/wsj/news/local/govt-and-politics/gop-law... Wisconsin is under one-party control, which makes many things legally possible.
rigged-system 8y ago
Serious WTF. Is this okay with people in Wisconsin?
- bilbo0s 8y ago
  OK, what is it that you suggest we do? Wisconsin is corrupt. Very corrupt. What might work for you in squeaky clean Vermont, or wherever, is not going to work here in Wisconsin. It's just not.
  - thrmsforbfast 8y ago
    Wisconsin had an extraordinarily well-functioning state government in the very recent past.
    - bilbo0s 8y ago
      (sigh) I've tried to explain this to people from outside Wisconsin before. Why don't I just repost a sort of run down of just a few of the kinds of things you can expect to see from our "extraordinarily well run" government here in Wisconsin: >"We've had our share of bent DA's here in Wisconsin. Probably the best story I can tell you about is a DA that would allow drug dealers and other criminals to "contribute to charity" in lieu of going to jail for their crimes. Of course, all of the "charities" they could contribute to were controlled by he and his buddies. (This way they could make sure all the "contributions" went for the benefit of the local community you see.) It got so bad that drug dealers were routing their shipments through that municipality because if you get caught, you just paid the bribe. I mean, "charity". You didn't have to go to jail. I won't go into too much detail on this one, because it's disgusting. That said, we have a juvenile detention facility where the guards were discovered to have using the boys for... Well, I think you can figure it out. If not just Google "Lincoln Hills". (but I'd recommend just ... yeah... just not googling it.) Moving on, we have something called the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation. Basically everyone chips in to a fund, via taxes, and that fund gives money to entrepreneurs and businesses to stimulate economic growth. That's the idea. In practice, whatever politician is in power funnels the money to his/her cronies. They're pretty open about it too. So small businesses in the state end up having to make do with whatever they get out of the federal SBA. Because the big political guys take all the money from WEDC. And that's just scratching the surface with the criminal related stuff. There's all kinds of political and public spending related stuff that happens here all the time. There's the typical police corruption that you need to look out for. Man don't even get me started on Wisconsin's part in the VA nursing home scandal. Wisconsin is so bad that at one point there were 100's of thousands of protesters outside our Capitol building in Madison. We're just a really bent state, and there's not much that can be done about it because of how we're set up. There's a lot going on up here. Despite what you may have heard on Netflix, the corruption up here is not ALL about Steven Avery. Illustrative factoid, there is a restaurant in Madison right on the Capitol Square. It's pretty conveniently located for the state senators and assemblypeople. Kind of a nice place too. What's it's name? "Graft", I kid you not. Located on the ground floor of a building full of lobbyists. I mean, "lawyers". Right across from the Capitol. I know that sounds just WAY too brazen, but it's a true story..." PS - People generally REALLY find the part about the Graft restaurant difficult to believe. I understand. So I encourage you, don't take my word for it. Go ahead, Google it.
bunderbunder 8y ago
It seems like the state could have expected a much higher ROI by just picking 12,000 random Wisconsinites and writing each of them a check for $230,000.
- bytematic 8y ago
  Or just reduce/remove tuition and student debt for uw colleges. That would be a very interesting experiment
  - huragok 8y ago
    Sorry Comrade, that would be socialism.
amanaplanacanal 8y ago
Do huge taxpayer giveaways to attract business ever actually work out? It seems like we see these kinds of stories over and over again.
- bunderbunder 8y ago
  No. Extremely consistently no. But all the studies finding that they're a stupid idea never make it onto the evening news, and sound bites from politicians do.
- maxxxxx 8y ago
  They usually work out for the company owners. Same for sports stadiums .
kevin_thibedeau 8y ago
Reminds me of GreenTech Automotive which used a similarly subsidized factory in Mississippi to build street legal electric golf carts nobody would ever buy.
garbled 8y ago
I really wish San Fransisco Silicon Valley homos would stop thinking the solution to the world's problems is learning how to code.
- jorblumesea 8y ago
  Yes, because "focusing on education" means everyone gets a STEM degree? Education takes a variety of forms including high tech manufacturing, healthcare, business and entrepreneurial enterprises, higher education and teaching, green energy and technologies, etc. Having a highly educated workforce will allow the midwest to better compete on the global markets. As someone who grew up in the Midwest, you sound like everyone I ever talked to who discouraged me from going to college. > college is for homos > learning is stupid > school is dumb Just sheer ignorance at this point.
  - macintux 8y ago
    Throwaway account created to spew vile. Shame to see this garbage on HN.
    - dang 8y ago
      Every organism has its pathogens. Fortunately the immune system worked (user flags in this case).
  - dang 8y ago
    Can you please not feed trolls on HN? This is in the guidelines: " Don't feed egregious comments by replying; flag them instead." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html For how to flag a comment, see the FAQ: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html
    - jorblumesea 8y ago
      Yes, good point. Thank you very much, I'll do that next time.
didibus 8y ago
I feel bad for Democrats sometimes. It seems they always inherit the worst mess.
pcurve 8y ago
Wow. I wish there were some type of criminal negligence law that can be applied to something like this.
garbled 8y ago
I wonder what it will take for the AIDS ridden faggots from San Fransisco to let go of the idea that making websites and shitty apps is the future.
njarboe 8y ago
In an article this long and $4.1 Billion in the title, it would be nice to see a simple listing of the subsidies. It is hard to know what is really being given to Foxconn. Seems like a combination of tax breaks and public infrastructure projects. Spending $300 million to expand an interstate near the factory a bit quicker that was slated for expansion anyway, should maybe not really be considered a public subsidy to Foxconn.
- p-squared 8y ago
  My recollection from earlier stories covering this deal is that "subsidy" actually means "tax break". If that's correct, then the tone of this story is very misleading.
  - simplify 8y ago
    How so?
    - p-squared 8y ago
      The term "subsidy" implies that the state is actively paying out cash to Foxconn. If I'm correct that these are actually tax breaks, then the state is merely claiming less tax revenue from Foxconn than state law would otherwise dictate. That's tax revenue that the state wouldn't see at all in the absence of Foxconn. And if Foxconn's locally-generated revenue ends up being smaller than originally anticipated, then it would stand to reason that the effective reduction in tax revenue is reduced as well. The article goes on and on about wasted subsidy funds (there are other valid criticisms of the deal, but this is the big one). The Foxconn deal may not be working out, but if everything is structured in terms of tax then the state finances are not really getting impacted.
otakucode 8y ago
With comments like ”There’s a whole lot of people out there scrambling to try and come up with a reason not to like this, They can go suck lemons. The rest of us are going to cheer and figure out how we are going to get this thing going forward.” It's pretty clear what happened. Walker isn't a fan of thing like 'reason' and 'numbers' and 'facts' and instead likes to commit billions of others peoples money based on his faith that things will work out if he just wants it enough. But what confuses me is Foxconn changing what they said they would do. When they announced that instead of building the 10.5 plant they had committed to building, they were going to build a Gen 6 plant, why didn't the state of Wisconsin say "OK, that's great, give back every last penny of money you have ever received from us immediately, and then we will begin discussions on a different deal since you have broken the contract on the first one?" Instead they just keep giving money to Foxconn no matter what they do? Just how many shares of Foxconn did Walker and his family and friends get for this?
- restingrobot 8y ago
  If you read the article it explains that Foxconn changed their plans after Wisconsin refused to subsidize a necessary Corning factory. I think that people are forgetting that this a subsidy to build. The state is not "giving" Foxconn money, it's just choosing not to collect taxes/permit fees/construction costs, for them to put in the factory. Once the factory is built, there is nothing stopping the state from modifying their corporate tax laws to recoup this investment much faster. Also your last statement is just preposterous notion. Governor Walker is not personally gaining anything financial from this deal. It was a desperate bid to push his re-election campaign. Personally I think that the deal has soured so much that it should be cancelled, but the original $3 billion for jobs sounded very sound. Especially for a very economically repressed location like Racine.
  - Clobbersmith 8y ago
    At ~200k/job, why not just have the state give universal basic income to everybody in Racine? Don't like handouts? Have them dig a giant hole and fill it in afterwards.
rconti 8y ago
> With other small costs added, the total Foxconn subsidy hit $4.1 billion — a stunning $1,774 per household in Wisconsin. Wow. You sometimes hear of things like roadworks project taxes costing a household $100 per year. But this kind of sum to create a handful of new jobs and a pittance of additional tax revenue?
apexalpha 8y ago
Why not just hand every single on of them $315k, let the market work it out. This is such a blatantly bad deal that I don't know if this says more about the governor or the rest of the state.

210 points by gok 8y ago

Money to corporations for lies about the jobs in order to win an election. I've seen this template too many times, this just might be the biggest one ever, however.

ourmandave 8y ago
I'm guessing the Amazon 2nd HQ deal will make Foxconn look like small potatoes.
- Arnt 8y ago
  You're guessing it will involve much more than $315k/job?
  - kbenson 8y ago
    There's something to be said for absolute quantity/amount all on its own. The amount/job may be lower, but it might also be a higher percentage of overall state budget...
  - ourmandave 8y ago
    I don't know, but you should see the future tax revenue Chicago was willing to give up, and they're out of the running.
jorblumesea 8y ago
Why not? It's not like voters hold politicians accountable, nor do they even remember these incidents in the long term. We blindly vote along party lines regardless of performance. We get the politicians we deserve.
Nasrudith 8y ago
This approach is fundamentally one of doctrine and ignoring what actually attracts companies and it isn't even what companies say it is - those are usually bonuses they want on top of what they actually need. It isn't taxes but resources that can be used successfully which itself varies by businesses. If low tax environments were really what they lusted for above all else they would start buying up vast swathes of unincorporated land. Basically nobody except maybe corporate farmers and real estate developers are doing that. The good news is that desired resources vary. It could be mineral resources. It could be location. It could be the labor pool. Infrastructure is a large part of it along with the local labor pool or ability to host one satisfactorily.
- kbenson 8y ago
  It totally makes sense to provide more direct incentives to the other end of the spectrum. What if Wisconsin could tell Foxconn that it's offering to forgive a portion of all student debt for engineering degrees in the colleges around the area? Or that it would reimburse citizens for technical learning courses or training programs for likely positions in the area? Or if Wisconsin was willing to forgive state income tax for Foxconn employees for a certain number of years (which seems to amount to between 5-6% of income)? All strategies that increase the attractiveness of the area by actually making the area a better resource pool over time, and in a way that helps citizens.

uxp100 8y ago

> In both cities, the company said it wanted to attract top talent from area universities. But Milwaukee, Green Bay, and Eau Claire are homes to some of the state’s lesser universities, and it was unclear why these graduates couldn’t simply drive down to the Racine plant to apply for jobs. What? Eau Claire is 260 miles away from Racine. Green Bay is 150 miles. An Eau Clare location can attract people who want to stay near Minneapolis. And the Downtown Milwaukee location is a more desirable place to work to Milwaukee metro residents than out in Sturtevant, home of that one Amtrak stop. You can't put a 4 square mile factory downtown, but I'm not sure why all your engineers have to work at the factory. Also, lesser universities? They mean not Madison. But if you're ruling out Madison (maybe they figure a Madison to Milwaukee commute is reasonable), they seem like good choices. Maybe La Crosse lost out to Eau Claire because of proximity to Minneapolis?

HillaryBriss 8y ago
OTOH, wouldn't FoxConn just hire any qualified person who applied from anywhere? they're not limited to UW grads or even Wisconsin residents.
- bytematic 8y ago
  Tax breaks perhaps?
- thrmsforbfast 8y ago
  1. That would destroy the whole point of the plant, which was to create jobs for down-on-their-luck Wisconsites. 2. If you're not from Wisconsin, why would you move to Wisconsin? There's nothing wrong with Milwaukee, BTW. Nice city. But there are dozens of other nice low-CoL cities in the USA, many with nicer weather and many still in the Midwest.
- tfehring 8y ago
  Any qualified person who's willing to move to the Milwaukee area. If you're not from Wisconsin and you're willing to move out of state after graduating, of all the places you could move to, why on earth would you choose Milwaukee? I like Milwaukee, I went to UWM for undergrad, and I might have stuck around after graduating if the job market were better. But if I weren't from Wisconsin (and especially if I were from somewhere with a warmer climate), I don't think I'd even consider it.

stevecalifornia 8y ago

No matter what the content, I now find it hard to read articles where it feels like the author has a personal point to make. This is somewhere between news and opinion. Perhaps the author's explanation of the facts is correct-- or perhaps he is interpreting facts for his own personal views. It's hard to tell so I just end up not really putting much weight into the article.

eropple 8y ago
That seems ill-advised to me. Yeah, he has a bias. So does literally everyone else. The notion of unbiased news is 1) fiction, and 2) fiction that exists to support a status quo that may or may not be to the readers' liking or their best interests. An honest accounting of where one stands allows you to calibrate for it. Dishonest impartiality--and, for reals, it's all dishonest--robs you of that ability.
nostromo 8y ago
Vox (which owns The Verge) was explicitly created as a left/progressive news organization. The founders come from The Howard Dean campaign, Daily Kos, The American Prospect, etc. I'm not saying this disparingley, just to point out that they've always had an explicitly left point of view. I'm not exactly shocked that they dislike Scott Walker.
ychen306 8y ago
The article is fairly well-sourced. I am not saying this makes it unbiased; but if you are not-satisfied with the conclusion, you can verify the quotes and make up your own.

booleanbetrayal 8y ago

It's also pretty evident, by this article's caption picture, that none of these men had ever used a shovel before in their lives.

kevin_thibedeau 8y ago
Looks like they're too dainty to walk on bare dirt either. They have a specially paved strip of asphalt to stand on.
mrfredward 8y ago
Not to mention the shovels are golden and they are all wearing suits. It could just as well be a political cartoon about a new Gilded Age if it wasn't real life.

jtlienwis 8y ago

What I find funny is that Wisconsin already makes a large number of the components needed for LCD monitors, TVs etc. 3M in Menomene makes the difusers that spred the light in back of the screen. There is TTM in Chippewa Falls that makes pcb boards that are needed for the electronics. There are IC design houses and computer makers (Cray Computer and HP) that can design the electronics. Foxconn buys the equipment to make the LCDs from the Japanese (Nikon) and they hire the workers to run them. Why not just eliminate the middle man (Foxconn) and make our own? I'm not sure the cost would have been much more.

Sephr 8y ago
Newer LCD displays will forgo the diffuser for mini-LED FALD backlights.

Animats 8y ago

What a sucker of a governor. "But all the other subsidies, worth more than $1 billion, will be paid regardless of money invested or jobs created." (See also: most stadium deals.)

bilbo0s 8y ago
I'll just say that while I realize that Wisconsin is extremely corrupt, in looking around the nation I've started to get the feeling that most of the other states are likely as corrupt as ourselves. The difference is that in Wisconsin we, at least, still have people that get mad about it, and occasionally we even have mass protests. The main problem here, (and it's frustrating), but the main problem is that due to the way the system is structured, we can do nothing about all the corruption. I don't like always being on the national news because of the latest governmental thuggery, neither does anyone among my family and friends. (And I was born and raised in small town Wisconsin.) There's just so little the average person can do, so you just sit in Markesan, or Racine, or Independence, or LaCrosse or wherever and you just stew in your anger. Then it even gets thrown in your face on Hacker News.
- bytematic 8y ago
  Fellow Wisconsinite here, what do you see as examples of corruption? All I see is Republican's dug in and using tactics such as voter suppression and corporate handouts. Is that what you mean?
  - bilbo0s 8y ago
    >All I see is Republican's dug in and using tactics such as voter suppression and corporate handouts. Is that what you mean?... Well, yeah, there's that. I guess I didn't even go into that stuff in my post on Wisconsin's corruption. (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18329653 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18329653) But really there's so much out and out criminal behavior that goes on here that I really don't think something like a really bad Foxconn deal should be entirely unexpected. If there's an opportunity to spend, 1 billion, 2 billion, 4 billion whatever in state tax dollars... I mean, yeah, in a place like Wisconsin, you have to pretty much expect that there are going to be some irregularities. It's just how things are done here.

Invictus0 8y ago

Is there any way for Wisconsin to walk back the deal? If Foxconn isn't building the plant they said they would, and aren't creating as many jobs as they said they would, surely there's some way to prevent the disbursement of the subsidy? On another note, I wonder what it will take for middle America to let go of the dream of well-paid manufacturing jobs. I understand the hope and allure, but it's plain that this ship has sailed long ago. Watching these snakeoil salesmen literally and financially strip-mine the country is just sad. I don't know that there is a good solution to the problem, as these states aren't really set up to sustain knowledge-based industries. How will they pivot into the 21st century? I can't help but think that 20 years from now, we will still just see more of the same.

arcseco 8y ago
>On another note, I wonder what it will take for middle America to let go of the dream of well-paid manufacturing jobs. I understand the hope and allure, but it's plain that this ship has sailed long ago. Liberalization of global markets has not had that long of a time to run its course. You speak so confidently that the status quo will run eternal. What is happening in middle America should be seen as pragmatism, the people of Wisconsin are beginning to accept their current predicament. They are accepting a leveling of environmental standards to foster competition with East Asia rather than choosing to go the way of the Dodo. Is this not what classical liberals dream of, a leveling of competition across boarders? So quickly the west is ready to externalize the cost of environmental pollution in the name of liberalization of markets but hypocritically don't appreciate the same leveling of standards domestically out of necessity. Perhaps the coasts should subsidize the cost of living in the mid-west to maintain the cost of keeping environmental standards well above those in developing countries. Please don't turn your nose up at people that are desperate to make a living and are willing to sacrifice a lot in order to do so.
- thrmsforbfast 8y ago
  Except by now, even Foxconn has openly admitted that there aren't going to be tens of thousands of $60k+ manufacturing jobs. WI spent 4B+ on the "deregulated manufacturing hub" idea and it's still going to fail to materialize well-paying jobs for non-college-educated folks. This by Foxconn's own public admission. Furthermore, the attitude that "either you're a coastal elite or you believe in the future of well-paid manufacturing jobs" is extraordinarily presumptive. Has it occurred to you that some of us want "middle America to let go of the dream of well-paid manufacturing jobs" precisely because we are from/currently live in middle America, desperately want what's best for it, and believe manufacturing isn't going to provide that? By the way, why on earth do you believe the Midwest needs manufacturing for a robust economy? That assertion -- that the Midwest can't build a thriving information/services-based economy -- seems far more like "turning your nose up" at the Midwest than your parent's post! Frankly, whenever I encounter this mentality, I read it as: "oh yes, those [small-town] midwesterners, what could they ever do for society if they don't have assembly lines to work on."

bonestamp2 8y ago

> The LCD screens being made by Foxconn require benzene, chromium, cadmium, mercury, zinc, and copper ... The Walker administration had also exempted Foxconn from the state’s usual environmental rules, allowing it to discharge materials into wetlands... WTF? Wisconsin is a beautiful state with rich wetlands and farmland. Letting a Taiwanese* company fuck that up for 13,000 jobs that will never pay back the incentives makes no sense, other than a small tick on Walker's re-election campaign resume which he is now shying away from anyway. This project needs to be cleaned up or killed before it starts to literally kill people in Wisconsin.

thrmsforbfast 8y ago
A maximum of 13k jobs. They still get billions and carte blanc environmental waivers even if only a tenth of those materialize. Also worth noting that the average salaries required to get those subsidies have dropped substantially since the beginning of this process; we've gone from "lots of skilled jobs" to "mostly $15/hr factory labor". Totally predictable to those of us who know the difference between "iPhone factory" and "Apple HQ", but this was a huge source of confusion among my non-tech blue collar Wisconsin friends. They [1] really did think there would be six figure tech jobs available to anyone with a CC degree. [1] edit: here "they" refers to 10-15 specific people, and isn't intended to generalize to "all Wisconsites", although I do believe there's a demographic that's being intentionally deceived and who would change their opinions on Foxconn if someone sat them down and explained that "working in an LCD factory" is not a "tech job" in the sense of six figure salary with good benefits, and that if those "tech jobs" do come to Wisconsin via Foxconn it's going to be a relatively small number of them and most certainly won't go to people who are straight out of high school after 6 months in a fast-tracked community college program.
- bilbo0s 8y ago
  >this was a huge source of confusion among my non-tech blue collar Wisconsin friends. They really did think there would be six figure tech jobs available to anyone with a CC degree.... That's unfair. Wisconsinites are not stupid. We knew what this deal meant for the most part. The issue is corruption. We have few effective methods of fighting it here in Wisconsin. I'm not trying to wuss out or anything, but there is a reality to life in a place like Wisconsin. Think of it this way, there is probably some percentage above which corruption becomes too ingrained, and you can't do anything about it anymore. Maybe that percentage is 10%? Maybe it's 20%? Whatever. But if a place reaches that tipping point, that's it. And I don't think that's unique to Wisconsin by the way. I think MOST states and municipalities would present the same issues if their tipping point number was reached. It just becomes very hard to do anything about what's going on around you.

duxup 8y ago

So frustrating to see politicians on the "conservative" side of things in the US who should be opposed to this on a fundamental level, jump into handing over taxpayer money, the environment, and such for what appears to be less and less. Also what is with Foxcon's constantly changing plans with all this? It doesn't seem like they have a coherent plan on what they wanted to do / want other than gather up taxpayer dollars... If Foxcon has no coherent plan, the deal should be off.

sbuttgereit 8y ago
Why would you be surprised or expect them to be opposed? I'll be honest, I think you misread what "conservatism" is really about... and I say this as someone that thought he knew it and considered himself to be a "conservative" for a long time. Their pitch is smaller government, but you shouldn't construe that to mean a non-interventionist government. They see a very active role for government in 1) foreign affairs; 2) economic activity; 3) social policy... in other words, quite a lot of intervention. The only real difference between the conservatives and the progressives are the goals of those interventions (somewhat) and the how up-front they are about their positions. Once realized that the pitch and the actual goals were saying contradictory things... I can tell you that I'm no conservative.
- duxup 8y ago
  I'm not surprised.
- amanaplanacanal 8y ago
  It's really hard to have legitimate political debate when you can't even find out what people's real political positions are. My gut feeling is that the blue team is more honest about telling you what they actually believe and want, but I might just be naive.
  - sbuttgereit 8y ago
    [edited: I didn't like pretty much my entire text; updated to be more clear about the same ideas] Team Red lies about what principles they hold; there are exceptions, like abortion, but on the whole they say they're for one thing when in fact they are largely about another. Team Blue is pretty up-front about their principles. For Team Blue rules much more by the ends justifying means. So they'll tell you what they're after generally, but will lie about/hide the details of what it takes to achieve the ends or the broader consequences of their goals that might not be readily apparent. Both of them want you to have an emotional response to their proposals or opposition than to try to have you respond rationally to facts. Lying or not, an emotional response is stronger, harder to dislodge, and avoids pesky details that complicate an otherwise perfectly painted, if not fully real, picture.

jorblumesea 8y ago

I really wish the Rust belt would give up their dream of recapturing a large manufacturing base and focus on educating their populace for the 21st century. Imagine if that subsidy money was used in education. It's pretty clear that mass manufacturing is a race to the bottom (China is now facing competition from Vietnam), and high tech manufacturing (Germany) will not provide the amount of jobs needed to offset the ones lost over the past 40 years. While manufacturing should always be a component of any mixed economy, many of those jobs are not coming back and we need to retool our workforce. A highly educated workforce is the best way out.

cmrdporcupine 8y ago
For that matter most of the rust belt states have very fertile soils and plenty of fresh water and historically were great temperate agriculture power houses before much of that agriculture moved to the year-round-climate cheap-labor zone of California. Now picture the world 20 years from now when drought and depleted aquifers make California not as viable for intense food production as it is now. Suddenly the east/northeast/midwest around the great lakes look pretty damn attractive.
geodel 8y ago
> Imagine if that subsidy money was used in education It is not the money that is lying around with government, ready to be spent. It is something that government could have collected if factories were built and they paid all the taxes. And I am not sure, they are getting built without squeezing governments on taxes.

qaq 8y ago

Too long to read is there actual breakdown of tax incentives vs actual $ state has to spend?

lewis500 8y ago

The subsidy ratio here is incredible. Alabama has used subsidies to lure automakers and other factories, but our incentives are peanuts compared to this. For example, we are getting a $1.7 billion Toyota-Mazda plant for $350 million in incentives, creating about 4k jobs. The state has a 4-5% income tax and 9-10% sales taxes, so I'd bet that, even if the 4k number is exaggerated, then the state and local govts will earn much of that money back within a few years (provided it doesn't create some pollution disaster).

simias 8y ago

The “AI 8K+5G” buzzword bonanza is marvelous. I'm surprised they haven't thrown cryptocurrencies and IoT in there for good measure. I'm also surprised to read that: >The Walker administration had also exempted Foxconn from the state’s usual environmental rules, allowing it to discharge materials into wetlands and reroute streams during construction and operation. The state also exempted the company from doing an Environmental Impact Statement. How is that even a legal possibility? The state's administration can just decide to suspend these rules on a case-by-case basis without any kind of supervision or accountability?

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
jpfed 8y ago
>How is that even a legal possibility? Walker didn't do it unilaterally; the legislature passed a law to exempt Foxconn specifically. They are considering giving Kimberly-Clark a similar deal: https://madison.com/wsj/news/local/govt-and-politics/gop-lawmakers-call-extraordinary-session-on-foxconn-style-aid-package/article_9b94b4bc-0972-553d-8c6b-379cebbd1269.html https://madison.com/wsj/news/local/govt-and-politics/gop-law... Wisconsin is under one-party control, which makes many things legally possible.

rigged-system 8y ago

Serious WTF. Is this okay with people in Wisconsin?

bilbo0s 8y ago
OK, what is it that you suggest we do? Wisconsin is corrupt. Very corrupt. What might work for you in squeaky clean Vermont, or wherever, is not going to work here in Wisconsin. It's just not.
- thrmsforbfast 8y ago
  Wisconsin had an extraordinarily well-functioning state government in the very recent past.
  - bilbo0s 8y ago
    (sigh) I've tried to explain this to people from outside Wisconsin before. Why don't I just repost a sort of run down of just a few of the kinds of things you can expect to see from our "extraordinarily well run" government here in Wisconsin: >"We've had our share of bent DA's here in Wisconsin. Probably the best story I can tell you about is a DA that would allow drug dealers and other criminals to "contribute to charity" in lieu of going to jail for their crimes. Of course, all of the "charities" they could contribute to were controlled by he and his buddies. (This way they could make sure all the "contributions" went for the benefit of the local community you see.) It got so bad that drug dealers were routing their shipments through that municipality because if you get caught, you just paid the bribe. I mean, "charity". You didn't have to go to jail. I won't go into too much detail on this one, because it's disgusting. That said, we have a juvenile detention facility where the guards were discovered to have using the boys for... Well, I think you can figure it out. If not just Google "Lincoln Hills". (but I'd recommend just ... yeah... just not googling it.) Moving on, we have something called the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation. Basically everyone chips in to a fund, via taxes, and that fund gives money to entrepreneurs and businesses to stimulate economic growth. That's the idea. In practice, whatever politician is in power funnels the money to his/her cronies. They're pretty open about it too. So small businesses in the state end up having to make do with whatever they get out of the federal SBA. Because the big political guys take all the money from WEDC. And that's just scratching the surface with the criminal related stuff. There's all kinds of political and public spending related stuff that happens here all the time. There's the typical police corruption that you need to look out for. Man don't even get me started on Wisconsin's part in the VA nursing home scandal. Wisconsin is so bad that at one point there were 100's of thousands of protesters outside our Capitol building in Madison. We're just a really bent state, and there's not much that can be done about it because of how we're set up. There's a lot going on up here. Despite what you may have heard on Netflix, the corruption up here is not ALL about Steven Avery. Illustrative factoid, there is a restaurant in Madison right on the Capitol Square. It's pretty conveniently located for the state senators and assemblypeople. Kind of a nice place too. What's it's name? "Graft", I kid you not. Located on the ground floor of a building full of lobbyists. I mean, "lawyers". Right across from the Capitol. I know that sounds just WAY too brazen, but it's a true story..." PS - People generally REALLY find the part about the Graft restaurant difficult to believe. I understand. So I encourage you, don't take my word for it. Go ahead, Google it.

bunderbunder 8y ago

It seems like the state could have expected a much higher ROI by just picking 12,000 random Wisconsinites and writing each of them a check for $230,000.

bytematic 8y ago
Or just reduce/remove tuition and student debt for uw colleges. That would be a very interesting experiment
- huragok 8y ago
  Sorry Comrade, that would be socialism.

amanaplanacanal 8y ago

Do huge taxpayer giveaways to attract business ever actually work out? It seems like we see these kinds of stories over and over again.

bunderbunder 8y ago
No. Extremely consistently no. But all the studies finding that they're a stupid idea never make it onto the evening news, and sound bites from politicians do.
maxxxxx 8y ago
They usually work out for the company owners. Same for sports stadiums .

kevin_thibedeau 8y ago

Reminds me of GreenTech Automotive which used a similarly subsidized factory in Mississippi to build street legal electric golf carts nobody would ever buy.

garbled 8y ago

I really wish San Fransisco Silicon Valley homos would stop thinking the solution to the world's problems is learning how to code.

jorblumesea 8y ago
Yes, because "focusing on education" means everyone gets a STEM degree? Education takes a variety of forms including high tech manufacturing, healthcare, business and entrepreneurial enterprises, higher education and teaching, green energy and technologies, etc. Having a highly educated workforce will allow the midwest to better compete on the global markets. As someone who grew up in the Midwest, you sound like everyone I ever talked to who discouraged me from going to college. > college is for homos > learning is stupid > school is dumb Just sheer ignorance at this point.
- macintux 8y ago
  Throwaway account created to spew vile. Shame to see this garbage on HN.
  - dang 8y ago
    Every organism has its pathogens. Fortunately the immune system worked (user flags in this case).
- dang 8y ago
  Can you please not feed trolls on HN? This is in the guidelines: " Don't feed egregious comments by replying; flag them instead." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html For how to flag a comment, see the FAQ: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html
  - jorblumesea 8y ago
    Yes, good point. Thank you very much, I'll do that next time.

didibus 8y ago

I feel bad for Democrats sometimes. It seems they always inherit the worst mess.

pcurve 8y ago

Wow. I wish there were some type of criminal negligence law that can be applied to something like this.

garbled 8y ago

I wonder what it will take for the AIDS ridden faggots from San Fransisco to let go of the idea that making websites and shitty apps is the future.

njarboe 8y ago

In an article this long and $4.1 Billion in the title, it would be nice to see a simple listing of the subsidies. It is hard to know what is really being given to Foxconn. Seems like a combination of tax breaks and public infrastructure projects. Spending $300 million to expand an interstate near the factory a bit quicker that was slated for expansion anyway, should maybe not really be considered a public subsidy to Foxconn.

p-squared 8y ago
My recollection from earlier stories covering this deal is that "subsidy" actually means "tax break". If that's correct, then the tone of this story is very misleading.
- simplify 8y ago
  How so?
  - p-squared 8y ago
    The term "subsidy" implies that the state is actively paying out cash to Foxconn. If I'm correct that these are actually tax breaks, then the state is merely claiming less tax revenue from Foxconn than state law would otherwise dictate. That's tax revenue that the state wouldn't see at all in the absence of Foxconn. And if Foxconn's locally-generated revenue ends up being smaller than originally anticipated, then it would stand to reason that the effective reduction in tax revenue is reduced as well. The article goes on and on about wasted subsidy funds (there are other valid criticisms of the deal, but this is the big one). The Foxconn deal may not be working out, but if everything is structured in terms of tax then the state finances are not really getting impacted.

otakucode 8y ago

With comments like ”There’s a whole lot of people out there scrambling to try and come up with a reason not to like this, They can go suck lemons. The rest of us are going to cheer and figure out how we are going to get this thing going forward.” It's pretty clear what happened. Walker isn't a fan of thing like 'reason' and 'numbers' and 'facts' and instead likes to commit billions of others peoples money based on his faith that things will work out if he just wants it enough. But what confuses me is Foxconn changing what they said they would do. When they announced that instead of building the 10.5 plant they had committed to building, they were going to build a Gen 6 plant, why didn't the state of Wisconsin say "OK, that's great, give back every last penny of money you have ever received from us immediately, and then we will begin discussions on a different deal since you have broken the contract on the first one?" Instead they just keep giving money to Foxconn no matter what they do? Just how many shares of Foxconn did Walker and his family and friends get for this?

restingrobot 8y ago
If you read the article it explains that Foxconn changed their plans after Wisconsin refused to subsidize a necessary Corning factory. I think that people are forgetting that this a subsidy to build. The state is not "giving" Foxconn money, it's just choosing not to collect taxes/permit fees/construction costs, for them to put in the factory. Once the factory is built, there is nothing stopping the state from modifying their corporate tax laws to recoup this investment much faster. Also your last statement is just preposterous notion. Governor Walker is not personally gaining anything financial from this deal. It was a desperate bid to push his re-election campaign. Personally I think that the deal has soured so much that it should be cancelled, but the original $3 billion for jobs sounded very sound. Especially for a very economically repressed location like Racine.
- Clobbersmith 8y ago
  At ~200k/job, why not just have the state give universal basic income to everybody in Racine? Don't like handouts? Have them dig a giant hole and fill it in afterwards.

rconti 8y ago

> With other small costs added, the total Foxconn subsidy hit $4.1 billion — a stunning $1,774 per household in Wisconsin. Wow. You sometimes hear of things like roadworks project taxes costing a household $100 per year. But this kind of sum to create a handful of new jobs and a pittance of additional tax revenue?

apexalpha 8y ago

Why not just hand every single on of them $315k, let the market work it out. This is such a blatantly bad deal that I don't know if this says more about the governor or the rest of the state.