It Is Time for Charlie Sykes To Move To Colorado

The triangulation was proper. Three stories converged this week and I suddenly realized that Charlie Sykes should move to Colorado where he can find true happiness in the thirteenth best state for taxes.

Charlie decided to merge the Coors-Miller headquarters issue with the most recent clap-trap from the Tax Foundation:

The Coors/Miller folks are about to sit down to decide where to locate the company's HQ; and they'll be comparing Colorado and Wisconsin...That's not good news....A new study drops Wisconsin's business climate rank to 39th. In contrast, Colorado ranks 13th.

The merger of Milwaukee based Miller and Colorado based Molson-Coors leaves many unanswered questions, including, where will the brewer locate their corporate headquarters. As the Chicago Tribune notes:

Milwaukee could suffer job cuts, while some of Miller's and Coors' advertising work is likely to be consolidated, analysts say. Draftfcb in Chicago is Coors' lead agency. Starcom in Chicago is Miller's media buyer, while Y & R's Chicago office handles the Miller Genuine Draft account.

At the same time the infamous Tax Foundation, as Sykes says, ,  "in an effort to boost TABOR legislation, gives Colorado a boost: For an executive summary, go here."

Over the past 17 years, Colorado’s tax burden has fallen from 22nd highest in 1990, around the national average, to currently standing below the national average.

This study is one of several debunked in Peter Fisher's Grading Places: What Do the Business Climate Rankings Really Tell Us? Here is what Fisher says in conclusion in discussing the Tax Foundation's report:

There is no point, really, in trying to assess whether the (study) successfully predicts which states will do better in attracting business investment,creating jobs, or the like. If it does, it is purely by accident, for the index does not even measure the effect of a state’s tax system on a firm’s cost of doing business. Even if the index appeared to be correlated with growth, one could not conclude, as the Tax Foundation would like us to, that lower taxes cause growth. The index does not measure tax rates to begin with, or even correlate with relative business tax levels. As a tool for assessing public policy, it is fatally flawed, notwithstanding its carefully groomed appearance of plausibility and academic credentials (however spurious).

Then there was the third story, that Brown Shoe Co, the parent company of Famous Footware, was thinking of moving its corporate headquarters from St. Louis to Madison. From The Capital Times:

The publication (St. Louis Business Journal) cited sources close to the negotiations in the report last Friday...It said Brown, one of St. Louis' oldest and largest publicly traded companies with about 500 employees at its headquarters, is considering moves to sites within the region or out of state, with a decision possible as soon as November.

This story received no mention from Sykes, any other right-wing radio entertainer or the Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce, all of whom declare the Badger State to be a 'tax hell.'

If taxes are so bad here, perhaps Sykes and his cronies would like to explain why they have not made the move to Colorado. In fact, if Sykes moves to Colorado by the end of the year*  I will personally pay $5,000 towards his moving expenses.

After all, why stay and endure another freezing winter here in Hell?

*Sell a Wisconsin home, purchase one in Colorado, and make it his permanent residence.

Comments

[Hermes]

Or better yet, how about he moves to Turkey since he likes them so much, according to his tirade on the radio this morning. He could prove the US is friendly to countries that support our imperialism by being a good neighbor to his lovey-dovey Turk allies! I'll chip in some money too if that happens.

[illusory tenant]

"This story received no mention from Sykes ..."

I'm sorry, but Mr. Sykes is not in the business of seizing some isolated anecdote from which to draw conclusions.

[goofticket]

The Tax Foundation itself is a joke.
Begun in 1937, to complain about the New Deals efforts during the Depression, they felt that taxes were too high, when the nation was broke and destitute.
This group has been a shill for the GOP since then.

Since national debt is a key to solvency, they never mention the fact that Bush has reaised the debt ceiling 6 times! Ruin the future for the next generation is not in the Tax Foundation's playbook.
It's give us more now, and to hell with the future.

This group has fudged more numbers, cherry picked more bad data than the MIT kids who scammed the Las Vegas Casinos.

The only number that are legally used, by the government and that is the US Census Bureau.
Doe the Census claim Wisconsin is 39th? No they don't...they have us right in the middle at 22.
Then again they also count, toll roads, local income taxes, etc ....thing we don't have in Wisconsin, which by any accounting would bring Wisconsin into a better position on a list.

Tax Foundation.....ask Britney Spears next time you need a qualified accounting.

[Northern Pike]

The core of principle of Charlie Sykes: Blame Wisconsin First.

[Kris]

Neither the St. Louis Business Journal nor the Madison reprint of the article mentioned that Brown Shoe has just moved a business unit from Los Angeles to St. Louis. I sincerely doubt that they would do that and then turn around and relocate to Madison.

[ray]

Whenever I hear a "conservative" grouse about taxes, it strikes me how seldom they talk about the services that those tax dollars pay for. The same goes for corporate taxes. Wisconsin and Wisconsin communities have shown willingness to pony up for infrastructure improvements, for example, when big companies move to the area. I don't know where the anti-tax people think funding for necessary programs is going to come from. When the private sector tries to do a job the results aren't good. This is because, while the public sector's mandate is to provide services at low cost, the private sector's is to provide services with maximum profit.