A $40 million loss as film crew leaves

Published August 30, 2014

Editorial by Fayetteville Observer, republished in News and Observer, August 29, 2014.

The first reviews are in and they’re bad: The audience walked out. The sequels may be worse. Somebody needs to rewrite the script. Fast.

When state lawmakers decided they didn’t like economic-development incentives, and they especially hated giving them to the film industry, there were dire predictions about what would happen if they killed them.

They killed them anyway. Just a few weeks from the General Assembly’s adjournment, the first of the dire predictions came to pass. More are coming.

WCNC in Charlotte reports that production of the cable TV show “Banshee” is pulling out of Charlotte and heading to New Orleans. The change is a direct result of lawmakers’ decision to let North Carolina’s film-industry tax credits die.

The action-drama series first appeared on the Cinemax network. City officials say at least four other shows were considering shooting in Charlotte but dropped the city after the legislature refused to reauthorize the incentive program.

The bottom line for Charlotte: an estimated $40 million loss. That’s a lot of popcorn. How much more business will we lose before ideologue lawmakers see that the game may stink, but we’ve got to play it if we want to prosper?

MCT Information Services

 

August 30, 2014 at 9:18 am
Richard Bunce says:

The next step for the State Legislature is to give all businesses tax and regulation relief... not just a favored few of the Democratic Party and media.

August 31, 2014 at 11:35 am
Norm Kelly says:

Richard Bunce is right on the money! I couldn't agree more.

Why is it that politicians and lib editorial writers feel no moral qualms with stealing money from one group of people for the purpose of GIVING IT to another group? This is NOT a helping hand for the needy. This is simply taking money away from people like me who are supporting a family, putting food on the table, dealing with increased prices at the grocery store, dealing with every level of government wanting to raise taxes, while not getting as much of a raise as I need to keep up. Taxing me MORE for the purpose of GIVING money to an industry that is PROFITABLE makes absolutely NO SENSE.

Every state in the union, practically, is dealing with tightening budgets. Eventually EVERY STATE is going to have to deal with giving away money to favored companies, campaign donors, or demoncrat allies. Eventually enough citizens are going to revolt, to tell pols to stop stealing from me to give to someone else, that 'incentives' will go the way of the dinosaur. In this case, we MUST consider NC on the cutting edge of the future. Policies like eliminating ALL 'incentives' does exactly the opposite of what demon pols claim all the time: they claim the policies of the current Republican legislature put the state backwards about 100-150 years. What the 'incentives' plan starts to do is move the state forward by 25-50 years. This is a GOOD THING regardless of how demon allies 'feel' about it. Thinking people, who don't rely on feelings, know that stealing from me to give to you is immoral. We need to start an 'immoral Tuesday' incentives protest group to bring light to this sad topic. Perhaps if we could get the reverend buffet slayer to attend our protests, the 'news' media would pay attention to us and start giving our arguments some credibility.

The BEST, MOST LOGICAL approach to the entire give-away programs, that pols refer to as 'incentives', is to do exactly what Richard says in his post. Make the tax policy EXACTLY THE SAME for every individual and every business. No special favors from ANY LEVEL OF GOVERNMENT for ANY business or individual (or group). If everyone is treated the same, then the most oft repeated phrase from lib demons will be a reality instead of a dope-pipe dream: both a level playing field AND everyone paying THEIR FAIR SHARE! What could be more fair than realizing that NO BUSINESS pays any income taxes! Not just the favored ones like GE that pay no federal income taxes because they are the favored allies of one particular pol party (the demons, by the way!). If every business were allowed to pay NO income taxes, wouldn't that level the playing field, and promote business? Of course, but it doesn't SOUND FAIR and everyone knows pols are more interested in SOUNDING fair than BEING fair!

September 1, 2014 at 1:53 pm
Richard Bunce says:

Norm, it is easy for politicians to tax an entity that does not actually have a vote for their office. This is reflected in the minimum wage debate... just force employers to pay the voters more, increasing payroll taxes to extend solvency of OASI and Medicare a few more weeks as a bonus, and these voters will vote for you... as opposed to taxing other voters to raise revenue so that the government can give an income support payment to these voters.