Rep. Owens' Funny Idea of Economic Development
Rep. Darryl Owens (2008 rank: #86) has a funny idea of what it takes to improve the economy. From the article mentioned below about wasting liberals' money:
Owens mentioned a $2.2 million project in Louisville for sidewalks. He said that money helped 20 individual small businesses.
Good thing we're paying $100 million a day in interest on the national debt for economic development like that! Icky sidewalks were the one thing standing in between the success and failure of those small businesses. When's the last time you were out running errands and were about to patronize a shop until you looked at the sidewalk in front of it and decided it might be too dangerous for you to go that way? Yesterday? This morning?
Now, if you gave each of those small businesses a $110,000 tax break, each could hire, say, 2.5 new employees. That would create jobs and have the same direct impact on the budget. Indirectly, it would have considerably less impact on the budget because it would create 50 new taxpayers.
Rep. Owens' love of concrete ribbons must just be blinding.
