Soon-To-Be Kansan Company Gets $5 Million to Move A Half Mile

Posted on by Patrick Ishmael

Earlier this year I told you the story of Teva Neuroscience, which announced that it would be moving fewer than 4 miles from Missouri to Kansas for what appears will be a tax incentive package worth tens of millions of dollars.

Well, meet the “half-mile move.” According to the Kansas City Star, SelectQuote Senior Insurance Services is poised to move just a couple blocks to its northwest, thanks in no small part to a multi-million dollar tax incentive package from the state of Kansas.

The latest round in the metropolitan economic border war is going for short yardage, with an insurance marketing company receiving $5 million in incentives to skip just a mile from Kansas City to Leawood.

SelectQuote Senior Insurance Services at 9200 Ward Parkway is negotiating for space at 89th Street and State Line in Leawood to consolidate its local call center operations. The Ward Parkway office is about a mile from the planned new location.

Kansas economic development officials praised the announcement, but a local civic leader who is spearheading opposition criticized it as more of the same business poaching that’s cost both states tens of millions of dollars in lost tax revenues without helping the overall metro economy.

“This is just a continuation of a policy that’s damaging taxpayers who have to pay for those who aren’t paying,” said Bill Hall, president of the Hall Family Foundation.

“It’s another example of companies that are moving to take advantage of this situation. Those of us who don’t move are paying for those who do.”

The map below shows how short a move this truly is.

View Larger Map

Taxpayers are being taken for a ride, and Bill Hall is right to criticize these handouts, which now have been taken to new levels of absurdity. Stop it. Stop picking winners and losers in the tax code. Make every business a winner.

On the Proposed Medicaid Expansion

Posted on by Patrick Ishmael

As our readers know, last Thursday, Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon announced his support for an expansion of Missouri’s Medicaid program. It is a  move that, if adopted next year, would take the state a step closer to full implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), commonly known as ObamaCare. “[Expanding Medicaid is] the smart thing to do, and it’s the right thing to do,” Gov. Nixon said.

Although one could describe Gov. Nixon’s announcement in a number of ways, “smart” and “right” would not appear in the parade of appropriate adjectives. And amazingly, in a time of record deficits, budget shortfalls, and fiscal cliffs, it appears that the governor has no plan to actually pay for the new entitlement he is advocating.

So, how would the expansion work?

Like any good purveyor of smack would do, the first few hits of new federal Medicaid money will be on the house. Under ObamaCare, the federal government would cover the lion’s share of the expansion in the early years, but by 2017, Missouri would have to kick in tens of millions of dollars to support the program. Starting in 2020, new state Medicaid expenditures would top $100 million annually and into the foreseeable future. The Kaiser Family Foundation projects that the overall cost of a state Medicaid expansion under ObamaCare could top $1 billion over the next 10 years.

Of course, Gov. Nixon will be on his way out of Jefferson City when most of these new Medicaid costs would hit in earnest; indeed, the governor would never truly have to face the fiscal consequences of a fully enacted Medicaid expansion. The real pain to the state will only come after he leaves office.

While disappointing, the tactic is not altogether unexpected. For decades, American politicians have feasted on the dangerous public misconception that federal spending through the states is essentially free money.

It is not. Missouri taxpayers are also federal taxpayers, liable for the debts that the federal government incurs in their names. In the case of ObamaCare’s new Medicaid spending, it is all debt, and there is no level of government cost splitting that can change the fact that Missourians will have to account for that spending binge now and in the future through higher taxes, fewer services, and almost certainly higher debt burdens on our children and grandchildren. The governor is already having trouble admitting to this reality as he hawks his plan around the state, but this truth is inescapable.

This is not “smart” or “right.” This is “business as usual,” and Missourians cannot afford it.

Protecting Missouri Families, One Thanksgiving at a Time

Posted on by Kacie Barnes (Galbraith)

Remember that time your older brother swiped the last slice of pizza from the box (when he already had two), and you realized life is not fair?

It is an unfortunate moment, and you can pout all you want, but nothing will bring back that last slice. You might demand from your parents that they institute a rule to punish any child who takes more pizza than anyone else; they will say no, and you will pout some more.

But imposing rules when something does not seem fair to you is not a good reason to institute a rule. It is dangerous to make a decision that affects others based solely on your opinion.

The legislation proposed this week to prevent Missouri retailers from opening on Thanksgiving Day smells like it is based on personal opinion of what is “best” for others. Would some retail employees benefit from it? Absolutely. But there is no way to determine that closing retail stores on Thanksgiving is correct, or good for the state.

Missouri Rep. Jeff Roorda (D-Dist. 113), who proposed the “Thanksgiving Family Protection Act,” said that as retailers have expanded store hours on Thanksgiving, employees have less time to spend with their families. This may be true, but I would like to highlight why that is not a good reason to enact this policy.

  1. Retail employees are aware of the expectation to work some holidays and weekends when they take the job. We all have aspects to our jobs that we do not love — should we enact legislation to prevent all those things from happening?

  2. Some people may actually want to work on Thanksgiving. They may depend on that extra day of income and this bill would take that away from them. (Or, maybe they just want an excuse to avoid Aunt Esther’s squash casserole.)

  3. If people did not want to shop on Thanksgiving, stores would be closed. People have demonstrated it as enough of a priority that stores decided to be open. It is not like the Target CEO is walking into people’s dining rooms and forcing them against their will to go shop.

I have worked in retail — I know it is not fun to be stuck at work when my friends or family are all hanging out together. But as Show-Me Institute Policy Analyst David Stokes said, “It’s not the government’s role to tell businesses when they can operate.”

Why Wasn’t the Blanchette Bridge Preserved? . . . Asks the Devil’s Advocate

Posted on by Patrick Ishmael

Tuesday morning, Saint Louis social media was abuzz with news that the controlled demolition of the westbound section of the Blanchette Bridge, which connects Saint Charles and Saint Louis counties, would be broadcast live. The Missouri Department of Transportation explains on its website that the bridge was “in serious need of major repairs” and that left intact, more expensive emergency repairs would have been “required at more frequent [intervals] with longer traffic closures.”
Continue reading “Why Wasn’t the Blanchette Bridge Preserved? . . . Asks the Devil’s Advocate”

Being There Is Not The Same as Being Better

Posted on by James V. Shuls

On November 7, I was invited to present my paper — The Salary Straitjacket — to the Missouri Mathematics and Science Coalition in Jefferson City, Missouri. Now you can listen to the audio of the presentation and see my slides:

About the paper: Imagine a school in which the highest prize for academic achievement went to the student who had been there the longest. Though it seems ridiculous to reward students in this manner, this is exactly how school districts reward teachers — by longevity. Teachers by and large are paid on a single salary schedule. These schedules not only fail to reward teachers based on their quality, but they fail to recognize that teaching different subjects and grade levels requires different skill sets and that those particular skill sets are in varying demand in the marketplace. For instance, there are reportedly 3.1 jobs in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) for every one unemployed person in Missouri. In comparison, there is only 1 non-STEM job for every 3.7 unemployed people. This means teachers with strong backgrounds in math and science may have more, higher-paying options outside of teaching. This is a reality we must address.

There’s This Thing . . . It’s Called The Internet

Posted on by Kacie Barnes (Galbraith)

One of my friends complained to me the other day that he could not find a website for a new business after Googling for a minute or two. He quickly decided that it had to be a scam — who could possibly own a business and not have a website?

Like my friend, most people use the Internet as their primary source for information. We expect to find everything we want with a few clicks, whether it is information on a new business, yoga videos for your cat, or a trip to the virtual banana label museum. Or more plausibly, a search for your city council’s upcoming meeting agenda. Because the majority of us use the Internet daily, it is frustrating when we cannot find something we are looking for.

It is especially frustrating when the information we cannot find is supposed to be public. Jefferson City just announced that the city will switch to an electronic record-keeping system to make city information more available to the general public. Our capital city already provides a good amount of information on its website, but I applaud the city for valuing accessibility of public information and seeking ways to provide it more readily. There are many municipalities and counties that do not prove this to be a priority. For example, Scott County does not even post its budget online.

To me, not providing budget information online is like getting in your car at 10 p.m. and saying, “Ugh, you know I really just don’t feel like turning on my headlights right now.” It is something that is so simple, takes little time or effort, and would benefit everyone.

More municipalities need to join the 21st century and provide public information on their websites. The Illinois Policy Institute provides a 10-point transparency checklist as a good starting point. People have a right to know about their government and the easiest way to give them information is on the Internet. In the meantime, you can use Show-Me Sunshine and Show-Me Living to dig into public documents and state government spending.

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