Atlanta Jobs

AJC, 5/13/18, page D1 article: “Atlanta would need strict pact for Amazon HQ2”, describes a bizarre “head tax” proposal in Seattle that has Amazon looking at reducing their headcount in Seattle.

We have entered the “twilight zone”, where local governments give tax holidays and bribe companies to locate in their cities and then charge them a tax for every employee they have in these cities.

How about this. Why wouldn’t governments just stop bribes and threats and let these companies decide where they will put jobs using the checklists they have always used to pick their sites. The free market works better without government meddling. When private companies need to expand to increase “production” to meet “demand”, they have several strategies.

When I was with Schwan Foods in Salina Kansas in the 1970s, we needed to increase production of our Tony’s and Red Baron frozen pizzas. We embarked on plans for lowering the temperature in the plant to 30 degrees to ensure food safety and also developed machines to automate ingredient application. This allowed us to quadruple production and we didn’t need to build a new plant.

But we did have a plan for site selection based on the workforce. The Kansas workforce was smart and hard-working. We would have put another plant in Millersburg Ohio because of their Amish workforce. They were also smart and hard-working.

In 1983, I moved to Atlanta to work with Hayes Microcomputer Products. We needed to expand production of PC modems to meet the demands of the PC revolution. We bought automated insertion machines, but we also needed to go from 150 employees to over 1000 employees to meet expected demand. Gwinnett Tech had 1 year certification courses for Electronics Assemblers and this provided enough trained employees to hire.  If we can get electronics manufacturing to return to the US, we already know we can get a workforce.

When Atlanta served as a manufacturing hub in the 1980s to the 2000s, our plants and offices were located in the suburbs.  If we can get manufacturing to return to Atlanta, these operations are likely to reappear in the many suburban office parks we already have. Atlanta’s warehouse hub on Fulton Industrial Blvd. is also available for expansion. I expect manufacturing to return to rural Georgia cities.

I am outraged that Congress failed to reduce US corporate taxes before they signed on to NAFTA agreement in 1993. I would charge Congress with treason for decimating the US economy.

Norb Leahy, Dunwoody GA Tea Party Leader