NYT: Obama’s Strategy to Reverse Manufacturing’s Fall

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/21/business/economy/21manufacture.html?_r=1


Peter Wynn Thompson for The New York Times
Douglas Bartlett recently closed his printed circuit board factory, Bartlett Manufacturing Company in Cary, Ill., because the property taxes were no longer affordable.


Buffeted by foreign competition, Mr. Bartlett recently closed his printed circuit board factory, founded 57 years ago by his father, and laid off the remaining 87 workers. Last week, he auctioned off the machinery, and soon he will raze the factory itself in Cary, Ill.

“The property taxes are no longer affordable,” Mr. Bartlett said glumly, “so I am going to tear down the building and sit on the land, and hopefully sell it after the recession when land prices hopefully rise.”

Though manufacturing has long been in decline, the loss of factory jobs has been especially brutal of late, with nearly two million disappearing since the recession began in December 2007. Even a few chief executives, heading companies that have shifted plenty of production abroad, are beginning to express alarm.

“We must make a serious commitment to manufacturing and exports. This is a national imperative,” Jeffrey R. Immelt, chairman and chief executive of General Electric, said in a speech last month, while acknowledging that G.E. was enriched by its overseas operations too.

President Obama, agreeing in effect, has declared, “The fight for American manufacturing is the fight for America’s future.”

The United States ranks behind every industrial nation except France in the percentage of overall economic activity devoted to manufacturing — 13.9 percent, the World Bank reports, down 4 percentage points in a decade. The 19-month-old recession has contributed noticeably to this decline. Industrial production has fallen 17.3 percent, the sharpest drop during a recession since the 1930s.

FULL story at link.

[Cronus Protagonist]

1. Yeah, sure, it's the property taxes

:^|

[madrchsod]

4. well.. he`s sitting on several square blocks of land

in the middle of a residential neighborhood. as soon as the market turns around his property could be worth at least a million or more. his land is one of the last large parcels in the city of cary which is in a very expensive part of the northwest suburbs of chicago.


google maps are really cool....to bad cary does`t have a street view.

[DURHAM D]

2. This doesn't seem like much of a plan.

Meanwhile, whatever dollars the business can borrow at the front end goes out the back door for property taxes. Property taxes are determined by the county and virtually all municipalities and counties are in desperate need of funds.

I own residential rental property - my property taxes doubled in 2009. I need to raise rents (something I have not done in 6 years) just to meet the debt service but I know all of my tenants and I know that all of them are paying on student loans and credit card debt left over from when they were in college. I don't plan to raise their rent right now - I plan to take it out of my pocket. I know this is stupid but that is how I am. Three of them drive cars that are newer and more expensive than my car - maybe I need to re-think the rent increase thingie. Were if not for the property tax increase I would not even consider raising the rent.

[rfranklin]

5. If you haven't raised rent in 6 years, it is time to do it...

Just raise it to market. As nice as your tenants might be, it is unlikely that they will volunteer to pay for any of your future expenses.

[FreakinDJ]

3. Thank God we have Free Trade with China and India

I mean really - who is going to secritly place the filtering chips in our computers