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Straight Talk

By James Hettinger
Senior Advisor, Battle Creek Unlimited
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Frequently, Washington or Lansing will say something incredibly stupid or do something equally stupid that adds significantly to the complexity of the work done by the economic development practitioner.

So what is it with this bunch in Washington and America’s aerospace industry? When they first assumed the reins of power, they relentless beat on the small aircraft industry, causing big slowdowns in business and layoffs for the workers. These toxic antics caused popular American employers like Duncan Aviation to lay-off employees for the first time in their entire corporate history.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is not how you save the middle class. In fact, one could interpret the imperious behavior of the Washington crowd as an all-out assault on the middle class. They are obviously willing to violate an important American competency to prove a point, however tawdry.

Recently President Obama demeaned himself by degenerating into the sewer of class warfare hyperbole. In his remarks, he made references no less than six times to “tax breaks for corporate jets.” Analysts looked at the President’s concern and quickly concluded that the impact of that tax credit was a little less than the ability of a fruit fly to manipulate ocean currents. It does not take getting hit over the head by an Asian Carp to recognize good juice for an afternoon of demagoguery.

Poor President Obama, he must not know that well over 75 percent of corporate flight itineraries involve skilled workers, engineers and middle-level management people. These are workers taking their skills to rural areas like the factory in North Carolina that served as the most recent photo op. These are people out trying to make their businesses work. These are clearly not the obscenely rich that jet-set in to presidential fundraisers.

He must not know that rapid and efficient uses of resources allow American factories to function and even compete with low-cost Asian producers. He must not know that China and the rest of our economic competitors can hardly conceal their delight when they see the American government meddling where, they, our competitors, have learned not to meddle.

Or, he doesn’t care. And aerospace is the last bastion of American competitiveness, the one sector where we clearly lead the pack.

What business is it of the National Labor Relations Board where Boeing puts a factory as long as that factory is on American soil? If the Washington establishment keeps it up, Boeing’s next factory will be far, far away. Goodbye more middle-class jobs. Thanks, Washington.

Where was the NLRB when government-subsidized, European arch competitor Airbus wanted to put a production facility in right-to-work Alabama? If government wants to get into the site location business, why didn’t they direct Airbus to build in Detroit?

I competed with South Carolina and every day I had to debate the merits of a location in West Michigan against the merits of the Sunbelt right-to-work states. I freely admit a little schadenfreude at the plight of my colleagues in South Carolina, but that does not undermine the basic belief that government has no right to tell business where they can locate their facilities, especially based on labor issues alone. Moreover, if we look at various works done by the union-funded Economic Policy Institute; we will learn that labor issues are not the most significant in business locations.

It would seem like good policy that instead of pursuing decline, we would want to raise up this significant American strategic competency in the aerospace sector.

Not this bunch. They have taken direct aim at a sector in which America excels and a sector that provides the compensation levels necessary for a middle-class standard of living.

Perhaps it is part of a plan to make us just like everybody else in the world. I just hope they put on the brakes before we catch up to Bangladesh.

Postscripts: Concerning my column on public sector unions, I was forcefully assured by a reader that it is no picnic being a prison guard in Michigan. Amen.

Concerning my column on National Public Radio and economic development, the International Economic Development Council has received an apology from NPR for the poor journalism.

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