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Empire State Development was to award Amazon a cash grant of $325 million from taxpayers. This is corporate welfare and a kind of corruption. Congress should b

Empire State Development was to award Amazon a cash grant of $325 million from taxpayers. This is corporate welfare and a kind of corruption. Congress should ban all government subsidies that are one-off and negotiated in secret with individual companies. There's an equal protection under the law issue.

otterley 8y ago
As an attorney, I’m curious as to how you think a constitutional equal protection issue is at stake here. I’m unaware of any case law that would suggest so.
- berberous 8y ago
  Here's an article by a graduate of GW law arguing it could be an equal protection issue: https://taxprof.typepad.com/files/65st0033.pdf https://taxprof.typepad.com/files/65st0033.pdf I didn't actually read it, so I'm not sure how sound his argument is. Even if plausible, it's obviously just an article by a recent law grad and not actually the clear controlling law today.
- bpp 8y ago
  I'm curious why Congress has chosen not to regulate (or ban) the grant of tax incentives to companies as enticements for development; this seems to easily fall under the interstate commerce clause. All states lose out when they compete against each other in this way.
  - berberous 8y ago
    There was actually a case where the court of appeals held these types of tax breaks to violate the commerce clause, but in 2006, the Supreme Court dismissed the case on a procedural issue (that the taxpayers did not have standing). See the below article for more. https://www.citylab.com/life/2018/01/the-case-for-the-case-against-economic-incentives/549632/ https://www.citylab.com/life/2018/01/the-case-for-the-case-a...
  - otterley 8y ago
    States can’t expressly discriminate against foreign (i.e., out of state) businesses, but it’s never been held that they can’t subsidize local businesses. Whether the latter amounts to the same thing as the former is an interesting academic question, but the law doesn’t yet say so.

otterley 8y ago

As an attorney, I’m curious as to how you think a constitutional equal protection issue is at stake here. I’m unaware of any case law that would suggest so.

berberous 8y ago
Here's an article by a graduate of GW law arguing it could be an equal protection issue: https://taxprof.typepad.com/files/65st0033.pdf https://taxprof.typepad.com/files/65st0033.pdf I didn't actually read it, so I'm not sure how sound his argument is. Even if plausible, it's obviously just an article by a recent law grad and not actually the clear controlling law today.
bpp 8y ago
I'm curious why Congress has chosen not to regulate (or ban) the grant of tax incentives to companies as enticements for development; this seems to easily fall under the interstate commerce clause. All states lose out when they compete against each other in this way.
- berberous 8y ago
  There was actually a case where the court of appeals held these types of tax breaks to violate the commerce clause, but in 2006, the Supreme Court dismissed the case on a procedural issue (that the taxpayers did not have standing). See the below article for more. https://www.citylab.com/life/2018/01/the-case-for-the-case-against-economic-incentives/549632/ https://www.citylab.com/life/2018/01/the-case-for-the-case-a...
- otterley 8y ago
  States can’t expressly discriminate against foreign (i.e., out of state) businesses, but it’s never been held that they can’t subsidize local businesses. Whether the latter amounts to the same thing as the former is an interesting academic question, but the law doesn’t yet say so.