Tax Incentives

As Mitt Romney defends his record running a private equity firm, he frequently points to a fast-growing Indiana steel company, financed in part by Bain Capital, that now employs 6,000 workers. What Romney doesn't mention is that Steel Dynamics also received generous tax breaks and other subsidies provided by the state of Indiana and the residents of DeKalb County, where the company's first mill was built. The story of Bain and Steel Dynamics illustrates how Romney, during his business career, made avid use of public-private partnerships, something that many conservatives consider to be "corporate welfare.

SACRAMENTO - You might think a tax law that rewards companies for killing California jobs and resurrecting them in another state would be dumped. Very quickly. Especially if it also rewards them for selling off property here and rebuilding elsewhere. Or, put another way, if the law provides a tax incentive not to hire or invest in California in the first place. You'd repeal it. A no-brainer. Makes no sense, except for the companies using the loophole while profiting from selling their products here in the nation's largest consumer market.

Executives from the U.S. hydropower, geothermal and biomass power industries called Wednesday for the passage of a congressional bill that would extend production tax credits to all renewable-energy projects. The leaders were referring to H.R. 3307, the American Renewable Energy Production Tax Credit Extension Act of 2011. The bill has been offered by Reps. Dave Reichert (R-Wash.) and Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.) and has drawn bipartisan support from more than 60 co-sponsors. Failure to pass the bill, the executives said, would put thousands of jobs across the country at risk, stall active energy projects and make it very likely that few new projects would get the funding necessary to begin.

Executives from the U.S. hydropower, geothermal and biomass power industries called Wednesday for the passage of a congressional bill that would extend production tax credits to all renewable-energy projects. The leaders were referring to H.R. 3307, the American Renewable Energy Production Tax Credit Extension Act of 2011. The bill has been offered by Reps. Dave Reichert (R-Wash.) and Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.) and has drawn bipartisan support from more than 60 co-sponsors. Failure to pass the bill, the executives said, would put thousands of jobs across the country at risk, stall active energy projects and make it very likely that few new projects would get the funding necessary to begin.

The State of California must get on the ball and create manufacturing opportunities. The states of Kentucky and Tennessee do this by allowing new manufacturing equipment to be purchased sales tax free. In Southern California that tax relief would amount to almost $80,000 for every million-dollar investment. Business needs a good reason to keep jobs in California; this could be one. In this state our citizens do one thing very well. We buy cars. Therefore, why don't we keep and promote automobile manufacturing and development here?

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Friday that California must boost tax incentives to movie and TV studios to help keep productions from moving out of state. He said incentive offerings by other states were luring studios away and costing California tens of thousands of jobs. Spokesmen for the Legislature expressed support for the idea but worried about the effect of lost taxes when California is struggling with a budget deficit the governor said could reach $20 billion next year.

Re "Three Things We Need on Taxes: Simplify, Simplify, Simplify," by Maya MacGuineas, Opinion, Feb. 11: How confused can we get? It seems to me there is a peculiar smell of the failed supply-side economic theory of the Reagan administration. How does one reconcile powerful incentives to save with the lesser ability to consume, i.e., to stimulate the dangerous slowing of the economy, under MacGuineas' proposed progressive consumption tax? In addition: If a person saves too much too soon he or she may find that, at retirement, income may be the same or even more with fewer tax deductions, and therefore the person will be in a higher bracket.

Disappointed that a long-awaited revitalization plan for Pacoima and several inner-city communities won't kick in until 2000, Los Angeles City Councilman Richard Alarcon said Monday he plans to lobby Vice President Al Gore in person next week to start the program sooner. "I will definitely mention to him that I'm disappointed that they can't expedite this program," said Alarcon, who represents the working-class, mostly Latino community of Pacoima.

More than half of all the independent film companies in America are located in the San Fernando Valley, but that number is gradually declining, along with suppliers and artisans. Twelve months have now passed since Bill Clinton was voted into the White House, in great part due to the efforts of members of the film industry who hoped that he would remember that the film business needs his help in order to survive. It is now time for film people to band together and write to Mr. Clinton and members of Congress to instruct them to enact tax incentives that will benefit investors in American-made, American-crewed and American-cast motion pictures.

Oxnard officials believe that their city qualifies for a state Department of Commerce program that provides tax incentives for businesses in an economically depressed area. In a memo to City Manager Vernon G. Hazen, Economic Development Officer Linda Guillis said that "based on preliminary information from the state, Oxnard meets the major eligibility criteria for the establishment of a zone."

President Obama preached a message of hope to factory workers on Wednesday as he began a sales pitch for his plan to boost U.S. manufacturing through changes to the tax code. Speaking to employees and owners of a conveyor belt plant in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Obama talked about the rising cost of doing business in China and predicted that more American companies will see the wisdom of setting up shop at home. "Wages are going up," Obama said of the Chinese economy, and it "starts becoming cost-prohibitive" to operate there.

As Mitt Romney defends his record running a private equity firm, he frequently points to a fast-growing Indiana steel company, financed in part by Bain Capital, that now employs 6,000 workers. What Romney doesn't mention is that Steel Dynamics also received generous tax breaks and other subsidies provided by the state of Indiana and the residents of DeKalb County, where the company's first mill was built. The story of Bain and Steel Dynamics illustrates how Romney, during his business career, made avid use of public-private partnerships, something that many conservatives consider to be "corporate welfare.

With its lush mountains, tropical rain forest and sugar-white beaches, Puerto Rico has long prided itself as a "paradise of locations" for filmmaking. But the U.S. territory has never been ranked in the top tier of filming destinations, in part because it had only a small pool of money allocated for its tax-credit program. That could change now that the Caribbean archipelago wants to grab a larger share of Hollywood's production pie. Last week, Puerto Rico Gov. Luis G. Fortuño signed into law a new package of film incentives aimed at making his commonwealth competitive with some of the top production hubs in the U.S. The new law broadens the existing 40% production tax credit to include TV programs and documentaries, and for the first time allows producers to claim a 20% tax credit for hiring nonresidents, including actors' salaries.

Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what your country has done for you lately. With apologies to John F. Kennedy, that's what concerned citizens should be doing to get their heads around the debate in Washington about the appropriate size and role of government. Despite how riveted we are by Washington blood sports, average citizens don't always understand what "government" means. That's not because they're dumb; it's because the nature of government ? especially the programs it pays for that affect most Americans ?

A "double dip" in home prices appears to be underway in the nation's biggest cities, jeopardizing the tepid U.S. economic recovery. The widely followed Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller Index, which tracks the real estate market in 20 major U.S. cities, showed that prices dropped 1.6% in November from the same month a year earlier, the second consecutive year-over-year decline. What's more, the index fell 1% in November from October, marking the fourth consecutive monthly decline. Last year, a recovery in housing prices seemed to be on track.

Could the forthcoming report of a bipartisan presidential deficit-reduction commission ? due Dec. 1 ? lead to fundamental changes in the way that homeownership is treated by the federal tax system? For decades the political rule on Capitol Hill has been that nobody messes with homeowner tax benefits ? mortgage interest deductions, capital gains exclusions, property tax write-offs ? even if they cost the government hundreds of billions of dollars in tax revenue a year and increase the federal deficit.

Federal officials will hold workshops in Orange County today and Wednesday to explain to thousands of Santa Ana business owners how they can participate in tax-incentive programs that so far have drawn little interest. The Department of Housing and Urban Development is offering $26 billion in tax incentives, credits and other assistance to businesses in economically depressed neighborhoods in Santa Ana and 47 other cities nationwide.

Tough economic times are providing the backdrop this week as television executives swarm Cannes in the south of France for their industry's largest international sales festival. European broadcasters, like their counterparts in the U.S., have been reeling from a steep fall-off drop in advertising revenue. Even more so than in the U.S., the uncertain economic climate in Europe has meant less money for independent TV producers, who are jostling one another to place their shows on the air. Michael Murphy is a longtime TV executive who launched a channel in Ireland in 2006, only to sell it two years later ?

Fueled by tax incentives, California home sales rose in May, helping lift the Golden State's median home price by 20.9% from its year-earlier mark. The median was $278,000 last month, MDA DataQuick of San Diego said, a 9% increase from April. But that reflects less a rise in the actual valuation of homes than a continued shift in sales away from cheaper, inland areas of the state toward more coastal markets. That shift is being driven partly by an increasing willingness of owners in pricier neighborhoods to sell at a lower price, DataQuick has said.