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"François, it's just good business" by dawpa2000 on Flickr
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“Business Friendly Climate” is one of the buzz phrases we see and hear a bit more frequently these days. I guess it is a phrase that may have always been around to some extent but is not just limited to the business press. But what exactly does “Business Friendly Climate” actually mean? Googling the phrase brings up millions of pages of hits with apparently every state, city, and town in the country making the claim for themselves. President Obama says the US must become Business Friendly to create jobs. But to me, the more often I see and hear the phrases “business friendly” or “good for businesses,” the more I become convinced that the end result will be something that is bad for humans and bad for living, breathing entities.
In case you are curious as to what precipitated this, it was a few articles the last week or so on both sides of the “it’s good for business” divide. First up is this article from CNN on Tuesday, July 12 on businesses “fleeing” California:
Buffeted by high taxes, strict regulations and uncertain state budgets, a growing number of California companies are seeking friendlier business environments outside of the Golden State.
…snip…
While not all companies investing elsewhere are doing so for economic reasons, some are shopping around for lower costs, lighter regulations, stable leadership and government assistance and incentives.
The most popular places to go? Texas, Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, Utah, Virginia and North Carolina, said Vranich. All rank in the Top 13 places to do business, according to Chief Executive.
Carly Fiorina, failed former CEO of Hewlett-Packard and failed California Senate candidate continued the theme of “business friendly” in this opinion piece at Politico, also from Tuesday. Then McClatchy had this from Wednesday, asking in the title “Would looser environmental regulations help the economy?”
And there it is. “Looser environmental regulations…” From the article:
WASHINGTON — Republicans in the House of Representatives are waging an all-out war to block federal regulations that protect the environment.
They loaded up a pending 2012 spending bill with terms that would eliminate a broad array of environmental protections, everything from stopping new plants and animals from being placed on the endangered species list to ending federal limits on water pollution in Florida,
The terms also include a rollback of pollution regulations for mountaintop mining and a red light on federal plans to prevent new uranium mining claims near the Grand Canyon.
Another Republican-sponsored bill that’s before Congress would weaken the nation’s 1972 Clean Water Act, taking away the Environmental Protection Agency’s authority to step in when it finds state water-pollution rules too loose.
It’s OK to poison the earth, air, and water but doG forbid anything should be done to stop businesses, right? Just today, the NY Times had this article on how a recently approved herbicide may be killing trees:
Manufactured by DuPont and conditionally approved for sale last October by the federal Environmental Protection Agency, Imprelis is used for killing broadleaf weeds like dandelion and clover and is sold to lawn care professionals only. Reports of dying trees started surfacing around Memorial Day, prompting an inquiry by DuPont scientists.
…snip…
In a June 17 letter to its landscape customers, Michael McDermott, a DuPont products official, seemed to put the onus for the tree deaths on workers applying Imprelis. He wrote that customers with affected trees might not have mixed the herbicide properly or might have combined it with other herbicides. DuPont officials have also suggested that the trees may come back, and have asked landscapers to leave them in the ground.
Mr. McDermott instructed customers in the letter not to apply the herbicide near Norway spruce or white pine, or places where the product might drift toward such trees or run off toward their roots.
…snip…
Imprelis is not approved for use in New York and California because both states have separate review procedures for such products. New York State officials say they have told DuPont that it has detected two problems: the herbicide does not bind with soil, and it leaches into groundwater. The state has told DuPont it will therefore not allow Imprelis to be sold unless the company provides evidence to the contrary.
Good for New York and California. And this leads me right to the point. With all the articles around the Toobz on “business friendly” there are a couple I’ve found, pointing out some of the fallacies of the phrase. Both Bloomberg with this opinion piece from last Friday and the Fiscal Times also from last Friday had pieces pointing out how the “Texas Economic Miracle” so often touted by Gov Goodhair isn’t so much of a miracle after all. From the Bloomberg piece:
It’s easy to be charmed by Texas, but it would be a mistake to think the state might serve as a national model. Texas created almost 250,000 jobs in the past two years, nearly as many as the other 49 states combined. Texas leaders, including Republican Governor Rick Perry, credit that success to low taxes and a business-friendly regulatory approach.
Yes and no. Those factors played a role. To a sizable degree, however, the state’s booming payrolls are the result of hard-to-duplicate factors, such as a fast-growing population, and unusually low wages.
Of course, the businesses surely do love the low wages aspect. But even in Texas, try living on minimum wage. And I have to be honest, there are many parts of the opinion piece conclusions (passing the so-called “Free Trade Agreements” and repatriating overseas profits at a much lower rate for example) that I find just as wrong as touting low wages as something that is good for people.
The Fiscal Times piece offers a different set of reasons for how maybe Texas isn’t quite the shining star:
There’s just one problem with that portrayal. While Texas has created more jobs than any other state in the past two years, the increase is far less than advertised, and the rate is not much higher than a number of other states, including former rustbelt centers like Pennsylvania or liberal sanctuaries like Vermont. In fact, the Lone Star State’s unemployment rate of 8 percent is ranked 24th among states, placing it squarely in the middle of the pack.
Moreover, to the extent Texas has done better than other areas of the country, most of its good fortune rests on conditions that are not replicable elsewhere: soaring oil prices have provided a substantial number of new jobs and tax revenue even as higher gas prices put pressure on other state budgets, and an influx of new government defense spending has pumped up revenue. Moreover, the state has used oil revenue to postpone a sharp cutback in state and local government employment, which is about to hit in full force.
In addition, Texas eluded the housing price bubble and thus did not suffer as much from price declines and foreclosures. After the savings and loan crisis of the early 1990s, which hit Texas hard, the state legislature tightened mortgage regulations. Even though Perry touts a free market economy, the new mortgage rules saved Texas from the worst effects of the national housing bust, even as construction employment fell by 95,000 and remains 14% below its pre-recession peak.
Why imagine that! Those dastardly, no good, very bad regulations that seem to be the root of all evil for businesses actually protected people in Texas from the very worst parts of the Great Recession.
Too bad the Beltway Village Idiots Politicians, Pundits, and Courtiers can’t see how eviscerating environmental regulations, banking regulations and such will not protect them from the effects of un-breathable air, poisoned ground and water or destroyed financial markets. I think it may just be a matter of finding which Dystopian or Apocalyptic fiction winds up being closest to the eventual reality of life on earth. Any predictions?
And because I can:
Cross posted from Just A Small Town Country Boy
24 Comments
Thanks Dakine; I have to fight this mentality all the time with the City Council of where I live.
But the Fiscal Times has the dating of the S+L Crisis wrong; it started big time in the 1980′s and when all was said and done, “The federal government ultimately appropriated 105 billion dollars to resolve the crisis. After banks repaid loans through various procedures, there was a net loss to taxpayers of approximately $124 billion dollars by the end of 1999.”
Here in NY we are trying to fight gas drilling using hydraulic fracking and toxic fracking fluids. Basically the industry is unregulated, promising an economic boom and jobs. People do not realize that their property values will drop once the water in polluted. The noise and air pollution of hundreds of diesel tanker trucks full of fracking water used for each well will ruin roads and neighborhoods. The 2005 (Cheney) Energy bill allows the gas drillers to avoid the regulations of the existing clean water, and clean air bills. Speculators have artificially driven up the expectations of quick riches through natural gas production, yet production is below standard for these wells. It is a socio-economic-environmental-community disaster waiting to happen. I compare it to the tar sands phenomenon in Canada. There’s only the aggregation of money to those investors who already are wealthy. The People stand to lose the environment, their health, the wealth invested in their homes and their futures. Meanwhile, the gas drillers bring in outside crews to do the work, so their claims that they bring more jobs are lies. A few people may get hired to move stuff around with loaders, but how many locals are trained to run drilling rigs?? Truck drivers will make some money driving water and waste trucks, but they can come from anywhere and will leave when the drilling stops. It is predatory capitialism at its worst.
Business friendly is code for no regulations, no legal or other accountability, no taxes, $.50/ per hour wages, and government subsidies (welfare).
This man may one day be President of the US of A if it survives Obama and the Republicans.
http://www.normansolomonnow.com/
It’s called The Rule of (Gresham’s) Law.
btw, http://www.bgladd.com/GOP_Wanted_poster.jpg
The bad business climate moving folks out of state XYZ story has been pushed by the rich and corporate since at least the 1950′s and no doubt before then. Indeed it is on the calendar every year in every financial publication, radio/TV program, and financial guru presentation schedule.
It always proves out to be partially true because there are always some who will cut off their nose to spite their face – in this case earn less so as to not have laws that annoy them.
Job creators! Job creators! Don’t tax the job creators!
And love the vid.
As Adam Smith observed, the interests of capital are often at odds with those of society. Therefore it is the duty of society to enact such regulations as it deems necessary to protect its interests.
Economically, ‘Good for Business’ Is Usually Bad for People
Reverse the statement bad for the people like Right to Work states means its more likely your state gets more money than it pays to the Federal Government this is not fair. We need to end all federal contracts for states that don’t pay at least equal what they get from the government.
Boeing is going to lose its company because a right to work state could not deliver parts Boeing needed for its years behind schedule dreamliner a lack of educated workers I’m sure helped that problem.
Lower lifespans and higher infant mortality rates in right to work states means higher taxes for the rest of us.
Lower pay for those with jobs certainly contributes to poor cheap food choices and less Doctor’s visits until a problem is bad enough for the emergency room again higher costs we pay.
Good Business needs us like a parasite to feed its host making all of America good for business begs the question who will pay the taxes the higher insurance premiums etc if the entire country has life spans and infant mortality rates like the Red States?
Where will Boeing find skilled workers? They tried and look at them now.
Where will the next great tech innovation come from Charter Schools? Private Schools show me a list of great inventors not many come out of those schools.
And listen to little mumble numbly peg Orin Hatch tout the big problems with the demos today when it’s really all of those millionaire Bozo’s in Congress, and his previous monkey boys executive administration from the Texas way of lying. All Obama’s done is become a man Tampon for the silly ass Southern Strategy stupid assholes like Mitt Romney will continue to forge. Let’s face it the President of the United States was here earlier this spring by the name of BiBi Nutinyajew, and Zioturds like Hatch can’t wait to get their next cut in the Illuminati action. This land is your land if you’re for Johnny Reb, King Oil, and The Arrogant British Empire
oh yeah.
Tell me how many people would not be alive today without Government Regulation that business hates?
Imagine a world where Chicago Slaughter houses are still selling meat with their old level of sanitation. A world where Coke still has cocaine in it because there is no FDA.
Seat belt laws? The cost to educate a worker is the same high school college etc the payback to society for a worker gets cut short the more we deregulate.
Never mind the cost the Gulf Oil spill cost the economy. Never mind the cost bank deregulation cost the economy.
Regulations save lives and lives have a cost. Regulations are like parents being home for a weekend vs parents leaving for a weekend and leaving the house with teenagers in it.
Think party! think your house is trashed. Your kid is in jail and you got to bail him out. Obama not prosecuting bankers and rating agencies is like a parent not punishing their kids for throwing a party, trashing the house and needing to get bailed out.
like the analogies
That Vranich guy again? Joseph Vranich’s business seems to be telling everyone how horrible California is for businesses. Yet nobody in the media ever questions his conflict of interest when doing stories like these.
Two things to understand about liberals.
1. They hate businesses.
2. They don’t understand why businesses don’t hire them.
If this seems inconsistent then you just don’t understand liberals.
Most capitalist business is bad for people. See Stan Cox’s book “Sick Planet” for an elaboration. When you have a system based on capital accumulation, most everyone is obliged to cater to those few with money, and so business must drift into toxic zones.
It’s just another of those catchphrases like “X Reform” where you might as well substitute “X destruction”.
Boy, that is really original and clever.
The saying “make a country or state good for business” is really a euphemism for “destroy democracy and install fascism”. Every politician who utters the statement “good for business” is really following in the steps of Benito Mussolini.
AND NOW, THANKS TO THE FED’S
SOLDERING TO THE MONEY-CENTER
BANKS, WHAT GOES AROUND, COMES
AROUND:
THE U.S. IS TODAY ICELAND AND JAPAN
(AS WITH ITS RECOVERY SIPHONED FROM
IN SUPPORT OF CHEAP RESERVES.)
not a pretty sight.
not a pretty sight.
And, of course, what goes around finally
comes around for Wall Street too:
let the layoffs begin.
https://sites.google.com/site/evernewecon/
It’s axiomatic that all else constant, if there’s a decrease in wages, profits rise. In a society of mutually antagonistic interests between capitalists and workers, if capitalists pursue their own ceaseless quest for greater profits it is at the expense of the working class.
Thanks for sharing dakine01. Great post.
We could write an entire dictionary of dog whistle politics phrases and “business friendly” would be among those phrases. Another great phrase from the kleptocrats who support Wall Street thefts would be “value-added”
“Value-added” translates into the Main Street vernacular as “Let’s add elements to an existing product to justify an automatic increase in what we are already charging the consumer–never mind that they never requested such “improvements”.
Here is an idea for a money-maker for FDL
CREATE A DICTIONARY OF DOG WHISTLE POLITICS FOR THE UNAWARE [Do Whut?}
1. From A-Z bloggers contribute their examples and definitions of what they consider to be dog whistle phrases. They can be ones used by the left and the right.
2. FDL appoints from its employees, someone to head up this effort.
3. Publish the book through Lulu ( or any other publisher) and market it here on FDL as well as other places.
4. The dictionary could even include illustrations.
Use the money to support candidates who will represent the 80% majority.
I don’t “hate business”
I hate businesses that think the only way to operate is to poison people or rip them off.
I hate businesses that beg for tax credits and subsidies that last just long enough for the business to depreciate the capital costs and then hold up the local tax payers for another round of credits/subsidies and if they don’t get their way, do the same thing all over again to another group of tax payers.
I hate businesses that look to the tax payers and governments for bailouts when they have poisoned people, property, and rivers and lakes for generations, all for their “profit” but suddenly can’t afford to do anything to fix the problems they created.
All of this is not “business” or “capitalism” or even “free market” – it is just the very worst aspects of socialism by another name.