Connecticut’s new Governor, Dannel P. Malloy, has proposed a tax plan whereby everything that moves, or doesn’t move, will be taxed or re-taxed, causing New Jersey’s Governor Christie to suggest he would be waiting at the border (between CT and NJ) to welcome migrators from Connecticut. Christie may become a relative star in terms of attracting and stimulating business, profitability and job growth, reducing state budget deficits, and now attracting talented and productive people from one of the most taxing states in the Union, Connecticut, to New Jersey.
I can’t speak to how many people will actually move from CT to NJ, but Malloy has fired back with, to paraphrase, the following: “Who says CT is not business-friendly? If you want a sub, come to Connecticut; if you want an aircraft engine, come to Connecticut”.
After I had caught the first part of his statement, “If you want a sub….”, I immediately thought of the sandwich, and that finally, here’s a liberal politician who really gets it. The sub sandwich evolved into “Subway”, which was even founded in Connecticut with $1,000 in capital. How clever of Malloy to invoke this jewel of American ingenuity and entrepreneurship. Today, the company has over 30, 000 outlets in 95 countries and annual revenues in excess of $15 billion. This is one of America’s great success stories (one man even lost weight on a Subway diet), and now a politician is going to try to restore the conditions that were so favorable in the sixties to business start-ups.
Alas, Malloy was referring, not to the $5 footlong for millions, but to the $2 billion dollar 375 footlong for a single customer, the US Defense Department,
Surely Malloy doesn’t think there are a lot of Americans who would like to have their own submarine, or their own 40,000 pound thrust aircraft engine? No. But the only businesses Malloy cares about are those that had their infancy a long time ago. His world is one of giant companies that sell to giant companies or to one mammoth government.
No liberal politician, for some reason, has any knowledge or recollection of what it takes to actually start a real business. This is what made Connecticut and the rest of America great … a phenomenon that no one with a career in government either understands or can explain, let alone export to others less well off than we.
Connecticut has 300,000 small and medium-sized businesses. These are the seedlings of tomorrow’s growth, jobs, and economic strength. Embedded somewhere among these seedlings are the Electric Boats and Pratt & Whitney's of tomorrow. Malloy could not care less about them except that, in aggregate, they will be a source of tax revenue … if they remain in Connecticut, and if they succeed in fighting their way through Connecticut’s ever-increasing regulatory barriers.
General Dynamics, the parent of Electric Boat, maker of 375 footlongs, employs more than 80,000 people around the world but laid off more than 500 people in Connecticut last year. United technologies, the parent of Pratt & Whitney, employs 215,000 people worldwide, has laid off 18,000 employees in the past two years, and its Pratt & Whitney 40,000-pounds-of-thrust-aircraft-engine maker is at this moment trying to move 1,000 jobs out of Connecticut. Great. Could you please pass the mustard?
dickshriver@wethepeopleblog.net
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