Voice For Liberty

Tag: Economic development

  • Ken-Mar TIF district, the bailouts

    Tomorrow the Wichita City Council handles two items regarding the Ken-Mar shopping center being redeveloped in northeast Wichita. These items illustrate how inappropriate it is for the city to serve as either entrepreneur or partner with entrepreneurs, and is another lesson in how Wichita needs pay-to-play laws.

    In August 2008 the city formed a tax increment financing (TIF) district to benefit the center. This allows $2.5 million of the center’s future property taxes to be earmarked for the district’s exclusive benefit. In January 2009 the city approved a development plan that specified how the public money would be spent, and how the development would proceed.

    The developer of the project is Reverend Kevass Harding, a former Wichita school board member who has announced future political ambitions.

    The first and most serious issue regarding this TIF district is that changes to the development plan mean that the district will not be able to meet its debt obligations. In the sobering words of the agenda report: “The TIF financial analysis indicates that the incremental tax revenue will not cover the debt service on City TIF bonds.”

    City staff is proposing to shift the debt to the city’s debt service fund, using money there to pay off the $2.5 million in temporary TIF financing bonds. Then, Ken-Mar will repay the debt service fund through the district’s incremental tax revenue over a period of 17 years, along with three percent interest.

    The original development plan from 2009 includes a table that specifies an interest rate of 4.91 percent for the TIF bonds. Now the city is replacing that with its own debt, and charging Harding and Ken-Mar just three percent interest. My calculations indicate this reduced interest rate will save Harding about $30,000 per year, or about $516,000 over the course of the loan.

    This action can only be characterized as a bailout, with all the negative connotations that accompany that word. It’s not the first time Wichita has had to create a bailout for a failing TIF district.

    The second item the council will deal with is a change to the development plan. The development agreement from 2009 contemplates that changes will need to be made, “with the approval of City Representative from time to time.”

    While the agreement doesn’t explicitly state that changes to the plan must be approved before proceeding, this is the only reasonable way to interpret the agreement.

    But in this case, Harding made changes before getting approval from the city. And he didn’t just use a different paint color or different flowers in the landscaping. Instead, he made a big change. He demolished a large portion of the structure that was to be renovated, according to the plan he agreed to.

    The world changes. No doubt about that. Changes to plans are necessary to accommodate changes in the world. But this is more evidence of how government is not prepared to serve as entrepreneur, or as partner with entrepreneurs.

    There was an agreement in place. Harding changed it, and only several months later is the city going to grant its approval. This places the city in the position of appearing not to care whether its agreements are followed. The council finds itself in the awkward position of approving an agreement to do something that’s already been done.

    (This is not an unusual position for the city, as recently it approved a letter of intent to do something for which it had yet to hold a public hearing.)

    Pay-to-play lesson

    Underlying the story of Ken-Mar and Reverend Harding is a lesson on the need for pay-to-play laws in Wichita and Kansas. As reported in 2009, Harding and his wife made campaign contributions to Wichita City Council Member Lavonta Williams (district 1, northeast Wichita), who is presently serving as vice-mayor. These campaign contributions, made in the maximum amount allowable, were out of character for the Hardings. They had made very few contributions to political candidates, and they appear not to have made many since then.

    But in June 2008, just before the Ken-Mar TIF district was to be considered for approval, the Hardings made large contributions to Williams, who is the council member representing Ken-Mar’s district. Harding would not explain why he made the contributions. Williams offered a vague and general explanation that had no substantive meaning.

    The close linkage between the contributions and Harding asking the city council to grant him money illustrates the need for pay-to-play laws in Wichita and Kansas. These laws impose various restrictions on the activities of elected officials and the awarding of contracts or other largesse to those who have made political contributions.

    An example is a charter provision of the city of Santa Ana, in Orange County, California, which states: “A councilmember shall not participate in, nor use his or her official position to influence, a decision of the City Council if it is reasonably foreseeable that the decision will have a material financial effect, apart from its effect on the public generally or a significant portion thereof, on a recent major campaign contributor.”

    In the absence of such laws, and with Harding and Williams unwilling to explain, we’re left with questions like these:

    If the Ken-Mar TIF district served a genuine public purpose, why did the Hardings make the campaign contributions to Williams?

    Must those who want to form a TIF district make contributions to the council member representing the district?

    If council member Williams is accessible to her constituents, why the contributions?

    Must those who receive money from the city offer a thank-you contribution?

    None of these reflect well on the reputation of Wichita.

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Wednesday September 28, 2011

    Obama’s intercontinental railroad. Burton Folsom notices a recent speech by President Barack Obama that mentioned how America built the “intercontinental railroad.” Folsom grants Obama some slack for the gaffe — we all make them, after all — and explains to readers the most important lesson that should be learned from our experience building the transcontinental railroad: “… the story of the transcontinental railroads really is a great teaching tool for today. If we study the Union Pacific, the Central Pacific, and the Northern Pacific Railroads, we learn they all went broke after receiving a combined total of 61 million acres of land. And they ran the nation deep into debt, too. … federal spending on transcontinentals meant corruption, land grabs, and wasted taxpayer dollars. But wait. The Great Northern Railroad, which went from St. Paul to Seattle, never went bankrupt and was one of the best-built railroads in the United States. Why did the Great Northern succeed when the others failed? Because James J. Hill, the president, built his railroad with no federal subsidies. He built the Great Northern slowly and made each part profitable before expanding it further. … Hill made profits and never went bankrupt. Here is the lesson: that which is privately owned is properly cared for and is best positioned to create jobs and profits. When the government gets involved, profits vanish and quality declines. Therefore, the president is right. Let’s discuss railroad history and apply what we learn to the present day.” The article is Interfacing with Obama’s Intercontinental Railroad.

    Alain festival starts. Today marks the first day of Jehan Alain, 1911-1940 — The American Festival, a three-day event celebrating the music of the French organist and composer, who died at the age of 29 fighting for his country against Germany in World War II. This three-day event is organized by Lynne Davis of Wichita State University. If you can attend only one event, I would suggest the opening recital to be performed by Davis at 7:30 pm tonight. The location is Wiedemann Recital Hall (map) on the campus of Wichita State University. … For more about Davis and WSU’s Great Marcussen Organ including photographs I took while climbing around the interior of the massive instrument, see my story from last year.

    How business loves regulation and hates markets. In a chapter of the book Back on the Road to Serfdom: The Resurgence of Statism edited by Thomas E. Woods Jr., Timothy P. Carney writes about the cultural costs of corporatism: “Despite the widespread assumption that a free market is the ideal economy for big business, and that regulation checks the power of big business, more often the opposite is true. Regulation, by adding to the cost of doing business, disproportionately hurt smaller business and acts as a barrier to entry, keeping out new competitors. Likewise, government subsidies can be far more valuable, or at least more reliable, then income for consumers, for which businesses must continually fight with competitors. The dynamics of the lobbying game are crucial here. Bigger companies enjoy a greater advantage in Washington than they do in the market. Not only can bigger companies hire the better lobbyists — former lawmakers are top administration aides — and handout more in campaign contributions, but they also matter more to lawmakers. The more workers you employ and the more taxes you pay, the more lawmakers care about your well-being, desires, and wishes.” … Carney goes on to explain that big government enables political entrepreneurs to succeed over market entrepreneurs. And big companies are better equipped to be political entrepreneurs. So while the standard account is that Walmart kills small-town retailers, the reality is that Walmart is effective at political entrepreneurship in ways that mom-and-pop retailers can’t be. “An unbridled free market isn’t killing Mom and Pop; an untethered state is.” The effect of this is, he writes: “And so reading the market is no longer as valuable as reading the polls. Research and development is not as good an investment as political connections. A good lobbyist is now worth more than a good idea.” … While Carney is writing about the situation at the federal level, we see the same dynamic at work in Wichita, where the city Council and its surrogates such as the Wichita Downtown Development Corporation and Greater Wichita Economic Development Coalition have large power over the granting of government favors. Connections to the politicians and bureaucrats that control these organizations replaces market allocation and market decisions.

    The Buffet rule won’t work. In a Cato daily podcast, Cato Institute Senior Fellow Alan Reynolds says “It doesn’t work. We tried it.” He’s referring to raising tax rates to collect more revenue from high-income earners. Reynolds explains that starting in 1986 and for the next 10 years the capital gains tax rate was 28 percent. But then President Bill Clinton lowered the rate to 20 percent, and Reynolds said that the stock market soared and the government was flush with cash. This, he said, was an example of lower tax rates increasing tax revenue. … Reynolds also explained that Berkshire Hathaway — the company Warren Buffet formed — was a tax avoidance device until 2003. As a holding company, it purchased companies that paid dividends, but Berkshire didn’t pay dividends itself. This practice avoided the higher dividends tax by converting dividends into capital gains. (Prior to 2003, dividends were taxed as ordinary income, which for most taxpayers was higher than the capital gains tax rate. Plus, capital gains can be deferred.) This purposeful design by Buffet belies his current contention that the wealthy should pay higher taxes.

  • Research on state taxes: Kansas should cut

    As Kansans prepare to debate whether to reduce our state’s income taxes, there will be those, such as Rhonda Holman of the Wichita Eagle, who will urge caution before proceeding with reducing taxes. Others will claim that government taxation and spending is what makes the state’s economy grow. Two research papers illustrate the need to reduce taxes, finding that high taxes are associated with reduced income and low economic growth. Research such as this rebuts the presumption of government spending advocates that reducing taxes will kill jobs in Kansas.

    One paper is The Robust Relationship between Taxes and U.S. State Income Growth by W. Robert Reed, published in the National Tax Journal in March 2008. The abstract to this paper states:

    I estimate the relationship between taxes and income growth using data from 1970 – 1999 and the forty-eight continental U.S. states. I find that taxes used to fund general expenditures are associated with significant, negative effects on income growth. This finding is generally robust across alternative variable specifications, alternative estimation procedures, alternative ways of dividing the data into “five-year” periods, and across different time periods and Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) regions, though state-specific estimates vary widely. I also provide an explanation for why previous research has had difficulty identifying this “robust” relationship. (emphasis added)

    In his introduction, Reed writes that previous studies had found: “To the extent a consensus exists, it is that taxes used to fund transfer payments have small, negative effects on economic activity.” His paper found a stronger relationship.

    Reed issues a caution on the use of his conclusions: “It needs to be emphasized that my claim for robustness should be understood as applying only within the context of U.S. state income growth. It should not be interpreted as being more widely applicable to other contexts, such as employment growth, manufacturing activity, plant locations, etc., or to the relationship between taxes and income growth outside the U.S.”

    This illustrates one of the ways we focus on the wrong measure of growth. Politicians focus on jobs. But to business, jobs are a cost. One of the better goals to seek, as Art Hall specifies in his paper Embracing Dynamism: The Next Phase in Kansas Economic Development Policy, is income growth, along with population density and population migration, productivity growth, capital investment, gross business starts and expansions, and customer service and throughput measures of state economic development agencies. Hall writes: “If Kansas performs well in the measures provided, it will also perform well in terms of job count.”

    Another example of research finding a negative impact of taxation is State Taxes and Economic Growth by Barry W. Poulson and Jules Gordon Kaplan, published in the Winter 2008 Cato Journal. In the introduction to the paper, the authors write: “The analysis reveals a significant negative impact of higher marginal tax rates on economic growth. The analysis underscores the importance of controlling for regressivity, convergence, and regional influences in isolating the effect of taxes on economic growth in the states.” (emphasis added)

    In its conclusion, the paper states:

    The analysis reveals that higher marginal tax rates had a negative impact on economic growth in the states. The analysis also shows that greater regressivity had a positive impact on economic growth. States that held the rate of growth in revenue below the rate of growth in income achieved higher rates of economic growth.

    The analysis underscores the negative impact of income taxes on economic growth in the states. Most states introduced an income tax and came to rely on the income tax as the primary source of revenue. Jurisdictions that imposed an income tax to generate a given level of revenue experienced lower rates of economic growth relative to jurisdictions that relied on alternative taxes to generate the same revenue. (emphasis added)

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Friday September 23, 2011

    Downtown Wichita site launched. As part of an effort to provide information about the Douglas Place project, a proposed renovation of a downtown Wichita office building into a hotel, a group of concerned citizens has created a website. The site is named Our Downtown Wichita, and it’s located at dtwichita.com.

    Keystone pipeline hearing, bus trip. On Monday the United States Department of State will hold hearings in Topeka concerning a proposed petroleum pipeline. Says Americans for Prosperity: “Our great country has an opportunity to complete a project that would provide billions of dollars in economic activity, create thousands of high-paying manufacturing and construction jobs, and at the same time take a significant step toward providing for greater U.S. energy security and independence. … Because the project originates in Canada and would provide a pipeline extension to the Gulf Coast, through Kansas, the project requires State Department approval. TransCanada owns the Keystone pipeline, which currently runs from Canada to Oklahoma. … It has finally received tentative approval from the Environmental Protection Agency and now sits before the State Department. The State Department is holding a hearing in Topeka on Monday, September 26th from noon to 3:30pm and 4:00pm to 8:00pm at the Kansas ExpoCentre, located at the corner of Topeka Blvd. and 17th Street South.” … To help citizens attend this unusual hearing, AFP has organized a free bus trip from Wichita. The bus will load from 7:30 am to 8:00 am at the Lawrence Dumont Stadium Parking Lot. It will return to Wichita around 7:00 pm. Lunch is provided. For more information on this event contact John Todd at john@johntodd.net or 316-312-7335, or Susan Estes, AFP Field Director at sestes@afphq.org or 316-681-4415.

    Health care reform. “Lt. Governor Jeff Colyer spent nearly two hours with the Legislature’s Joint Committee on Health Policy Oversight Monday explaining the imperative and complexity of solving problems with government health care he likened to a Rubik’s Cube. The challenge of the 1974 puzzle and the current Medicaid and health care debate is finding a way to align multiple facets of each side without upsetting another side.” More from Kansas Watchdog at Public Health Care System Reform a Governmental Rubik’s Cube .

    Pompeo defends against Obama’s attack on aviation. “Rep. Mike Pompeo (KS-04) spoke on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives in defense of the general aviation community, which is so important to job sustainability and job growth in South Central Kansas.” Video from C-Span is at Pompeo House speech on aviation.

    Wichita corporate welfare opposed. This week the Wichita City Council granted another forgivable loan. Thank you to John Todd for appearing and offering testimony opposing the loan. In his remarks, Todd said: “Over the past few months, I have watched a majority of this council fall into the trap of trying to buy customer business with free-money economic development schemes out of the public treasury. This program might work if the public treasury held unlimited funds and the public gifts were offered to every business owner on an equal basis. … In 1887 President Grover Cleveland vetoed a bill that would have given $10,000 for seed to farmers in drought-stricken Texas saying something to the effect that he could not be a party to taking money out of the treasury to benefit one group of people at the expense of another group, no matter how worthy the cause, stating that it is the responsibility of citizens to support the government and not the responsibility of government to support the people. Cleveland further issued a challenge for private charitable giving for the farmers. A number of newspapers adopted the relief campaign and in the end Americans voluntarily donated not $10,000 but $100,000 to the afflicted farmers. I would suggest a similar publicly driven voluntary relief campaign in lieu of the forgivable loan you are considering today to see if there is public sentiment to charitably fund this local economic development project.” … I’ve been told what the target company really needs is relief from a regulatory trap.

    The trap of job creation. Today on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal program, Rhone Resch of the Solar Energy Industries Association appeared. He promoted solar energy as great for creating jobs, telling viewers that solar energy creates more jobs per megawatt than any other form of power generation. This illustrates the trap that politicians and those who benefit from government subsidy usually fall into: that more jobs is a good thing. Wouldn’t it be much better if we could generate all the electricity we wanted using fewer jobs? Then these surplus employees could be put to work on something else — or simply enjoy leisure. … A few years ago an editorial written by a labor union official appeared in Kansas, praising the job-creating power of wind energy. In response, I wrote “After all, if we view our energy policy as a jobs creation program, why not build wind turbines and haul them to western Kansas without the use of machinery? Think of the jobs that would create.” … In a video produced by the Cato Institute, Caleb Brown explains the problems with relying on government and its spending for jobs: “Politicians and entrepreneurs face different problems. Entrepreneurs care about creating wealth, both for their customers and themselves. This means getting more output with fewer inputs. Politicians often care more about maximizing inputs like labor, even when that job creation could make all of us materially worse off. It would be easy for the president and Congress to create new jobs: They could simply ban the use of computers, farm machinery, or any other labor-saving device. But that would clearly raise prices … It’s hard to see how that improves anyone’s standard of living.”

  • At Wichita City Council, facts are in dispute

    Some Wichita City Council members, including Mayor Carl Brewer criticize people who speak at council meetings for using inaccurate information. Although most citizens who speak are willing to take questions at the time they present their testimony, most council members will not engage in dialog with them, instead choosing to level their criticism at a time when the speakers are not able to defend themselves.

    So let’s take a look at some of the statements made by city council members at the September 13th meeting, where the council approved by a six to one vote a package of incentives for the Douglas Place project, a downtown hotel.

    James Clendenin

    At the September 13th meeting, James Clendenin (district 3, south and southeast Wichita) said “I heard a lot of misinformation, and I heard a lot of good information.” He seemed to be most interested in the jobs that the hotel will create. Referring to the contention that the hotel will create 100 jobs, he said: “That’s all people ask me about — how many jobs. Just tell me jobs. I want to know jobs — jobs, jobs, jobs — people want to know jobs. I know that when Old Town was started 20 years ago, no jobs where in that part of the city. 20 years later we have jobs. … But I see people employed 20 years later that would never would have been employed unless a developer stepped up.”

    I can understand the concern for jobs and how council members want to be seen doing things that they believe will create jobs. But it’s difficult to see how this hotel will create new jobs, except perhaps on the several times each year that the hotel might be used to support the larger conventions the city hopes to draw.

    Instead, it’s much more likely that the hotel will simply draw most of its customers from the pool of people already planning to come to Wichita. And this hotel will have a big advantage in competing for these existing customers, especially those looking for a high-end hotel. As reported in the Wichita Eagle, the hotel developers said that without the city subsidy, the rooms would cost $250 per night. Their plans, however, are to offer the rooms for $150.

    So with the help of taxpayers, the developers get to offer a $250 product for $150. That’s quite a competitive boost. My research shows that currently there are four downtown Wichita hotels offering rooms at that rate or higher. I wonder how they will feel when undercut by a taxpayer-subsidized competitor? (First, the owners of these hotels will have to realize that they, too, have received substantial subsidy.)

    As to the impact of subsidies like Tax increment financing, or TIF: The important paper Tax Increment Financing: A Tool for Local Economic Development by Richard F. Dye and David F. Merriman comes to these conclusions:

    If the use of tax increment financing stimulates economic development, there should be a positive relationship between TIF adoption and overall growth in municipalities. This did not occur. If, on the other hand, TIF merely moves capital around within a municipality, there should be no relationship between TIF adoption and growth. What we find, however, is a negative relationship. Municipalities that use TIF do worse.

    We find evidence that the non-TIF areas of municipalities that use TIF grow no more rapidly, and perhaps more slowly, than similar municipalities that do not use TIF. (emphasis added)

    Later, the paper concluded: “TIF subsidies might be helping growth within the TIF district, but they are hurting growth outside the district by a larger amount.”

    This paper addresses economic growth, which is not, strictly speaking, equivalent to jobs, although the two are closely related. A paper that does address the impact of TIF on jobs is from Paul F. Byrne of Washburn University. The title of the report is Does Tax Increment Financing Deliver on Its Promise of Jobs? The Impact of Tax Increment Financing on Municipal Employment Growth, and in the abstract we find this conclusion regarding the impact of TIF on jobs:

    Increasingly, municipal leaders justify their use of tax increment financing (TIF) by touting its role in improving municipal employment. However, empirical studies on TIF have primarily examined TIF’s impact on property values, ignoring the claim that serves as the primary justification for its use. This article addresses the claim by examining the impact of TIF adoption on municipal employment growth in Illinois, looking for both general impact and impact specific to the type of development supported. Results find no general impact of TIF use on employment. However, findings suggest that TIF districts supporting industrial development may have a positive effect on municipal employment, whereas TIF districts supporting retail development have a negative effect on municipal employment. These results are consistent with industrial TIF districts capturing employment that would have otherwise occurred outside of the adopting municipality and retail TIF districts shifting employment within the municipality to more labor-efficient retailers within the TIF district. (emphasis added)

    I would ask that council member Clendenin and the others read research like this before they come to their conclusions.

    Furthermore, we might ask the hotel developers if they are going to run their hotel as a jobs program, or are they going to seek to minimize the use of labor, employing only as much as is required to run the hotel the way they want? In a competitive marketplace, this is what businesses are forced to do, if they want to stay in business.

    Finally, the contention of Clendenin that there are people who are employed only because of Old Town is laughable.

    Pete Meitzner

    Newly-elected council member Pete Meitzner (district 2, east Wichita) seemed impressed and secure in that the hotel developers have agreed to personally guarantee any shortfall in property tax revenue below what is necessary to cover the payments on the bonds the city is issuing under tax increment financing.

    This guarantee is quite unlikely to ever be tapped, and is an example of offering something at little risk and no cost to the developers. Then, gullible city council members lap it up.

    Here’s how the arithmetic works: According to city documents, the projected debt service required to pay the TIF bonds in 2016 is $340,000. For the same year, the projected revenue from the hotel’s property tax that is applicable to the TIF bond repayments is $262,000. (Remember these property taxes are taxes the hotel must pay, no matter what they’re used for.)

    For the hotel owners to become in a position where they would have to pay to cover a shortfall, the value of the hotel would have to drop by 23 percent. That’s not likely to happen, and if something like that did, it would be a signal of severe problems across the entire city, or country, for that matter.

    Jeff Longwell

    Speaking from the bench when he could not be rebutted by citizens, Council Member Jeff Longwell criticized citizens who testified, saying they are using “wrong numbers.” Longwell’s criticisms deserve scrutiny.

    During the council meeting, there were several ratios presented as a way to evaluate the hotel, and Longwell confused them. He said: “You can argue if it’s 6 to 1, or 5 to 1, but I’ll tell you, even if it’s as low as 2.6 to 1 return, folks, that’s a great investment.”

    The 6 to 1 ratio is the ratio of private investment to public investment, as calculated by the city.

    The 2.6 to 1 return is a payback to the city, based on expected increased tax revenues compared to the city’s cost. This is calculated by the Wichita State University Center for Economic Development and Business Research.

    The 6 to 1 ratio is based on balance sheet concepts. It refers to assets.

    The 2.6 to 1 ratio is a calculation from an income statement. It refers to income relative to expenses.

    The only conclusion to draw is that Longwell is sorely confused. Perhaps worse, Allen Bell, Wichita’s Director of Urban Development had just explained these numbers in response to a question by Meitzner. But Bell didn’t correct Longwell. Neither did the city manager, who undoubtedly knows the difference between the two sets of numbers.

    Besides this, the 6 to 1 ratio is calculated using an extremely narrow view of the city’s investment in the project, and an overly expansive assessment of the developer’s investment. It ignores many subsidies being provided to the developers, some at city expense, and also at the expense of state and federal taxpayers.

    Further, for that ratio to make any sense, you have to assume city ownership of the hotel. “We” — meaning the city of Wichita — don’t own the “6” part of the ratio. The hotel developers do. It’s not a public asset.

    Janet Miller

    Like Clendenin and Longwell, Council Member Janet Miller (district 6, north central Wichita) criticized the inaccurate information presented by citizens: “A lot of the information that was shared this morning was not accurate. … I’m not going to be able to address everything.”

    Here’s an example of the reasoning of Miller. Referring to the issue of tax money being diverted to the Douglas Place project, she said: “Other taxes, such as the historic and federal tax credits are not property taxes, they’re not sales taxes, those are credits toward income taxes. So unless you’re paying the income taxes those are not your taxes.”

    Here Miller is ignoring the effect of tax credits on the budgets of states and the federal government. Tax credits reduce the revenue of the issuing body by the amount of the credit. So when the state of Kansas issues $3,800,000 in tax credits to the Douglas Place project, it reduces revenue to the state by that same amount.

    Now if the state were to reduce its spending by that same amount, specifically based on the issuance of this tax credit, we’d be left with no impact on the state’s budget.

    But the state isn’t going to to that — it never has. So taxpayers across the state must make up the difference — directly contradicting Miller’s contention that “those are not your taxes.”

    The same reasoning applies to the federal tax credits of $3,500,000 that this project is seeking.

    Miller also contended that the guest taxes paid by this hotel are “not your taxes.” According to the city’s budget, the purpose of the Tourism and Convention Fund, which is funded by the guest tax, is to “support tourism and convention, infrastructure, and promotion of the City.” Its outlined priorities are to be “debt service for tourism and convention facilities, operational deficit subsidies, and care and maintenance of Century II.”

    So, yes, I would say that the guest tax is “our” tax. There are those who are asking for millions to renovate Century II. Since this hotel’s guest tax — most of it — will not be going to that goal, someone else has to pay.

    Further, to the extent that the new hotel draws guests from other hotels, that guest tax is being diverted away from the Tourism and Convention Fund. (Of course, we have to remember that many other hotels have a similar deal to benefit from their guest taxes. Last year the city gifted the Fairfield Inn & Suites Wichita Downtown, part of the heavily subsidized WaterWalk project, $2,500,000, to be paid back by the hotel’s guest tax receipts.)

    Miller also took issue with those who contend that the original plan called for Key Construction to build the parking garage: “While there was a general contractor, and that part of the project would not have been bid out, the rest of it would have been bid thorough the city’s process. So the vast majority, except for about 6 percent of the project, would have been bid out through the city’s bid project.”

    Miller is specifically contradicted by the letter of intent that she voted for at the August 9th meeting of the council. The letter states: “Douglas Place LLC, will acquire and rehabilitate the Douglas Building and will construct the parking garage and urban park.”

    Does she think that the principals of Key Construction — who are part of the development team of the Douglas Place project, and who have made heavy campaign contributions to Miller and others — would let someone else build the garage?

    Furthermore, at the same meeting City Attorney Gary Rebenstorf said it was the developer’s preference that the garage be built without competitive bidding — again contradicting Miller’s contention that the garage would be bid on.

    And if we take Miller’s statement at face value — “the vast majority, except for about 6 percent of the project, would have been bid out” — does this imply that 94 percent of the project will be bid out? This would imply that the hotel itself would be placed for public bid, and I don’t think there’s been any consideration of that.

    Miller also addressed the issue of special assessment financing. That is part of the Douglas Place project, with $1,500,000 to be used for facade improvement and lead paint and asbestos removal. Miller said: “Just as a reminder: The facade improvement and asbestos removal expenses, all of that — those dollars are being repaid through special assessments. For those of you who are critical of special assessment financing, I would encourage you to look at your annual tax bill and see if it says special assessment on there. If it does, we have loaned your developer money to put in public improvements around your property. There’s a very large share of Wichita’s outstanding debt that is developers’ specials. So if we want to be critical of developers specials, that’s gonna be a really big conversation that will include all the housing developers in this city and how those dollars are lent and repaid over years.”

    There’s a big distinction between the way special assessment financing is used for new development as compared to this project. On new developments, special assessment financing is used to pay for public improvements like streets, sewers, water mains, and storm water drainage. After they are built, these assets are then owned by the city. They become city assets, but were paid for by the developer.

    That’s not going to happen with this hotel. Its owners will not deed over the building’s facade to the city. It will remain a private asset.

    Furthermore, in new development, the assets that special assessment financing is used to pay for support development that generally ends up on the tax roles, providing the tax revenue stream that city council members promote as good. But not so with this hotel. Being in a TIF district, its property taxes — except for 30 percent — do not benefit the city, as they are used to benefit the developers.

  • In Wichita, historic preservation tax credits an inefficient form of developer welfare

    As part of the subsidy plan for Douglas Place, a downtown Wichita hotel being proposed, developers plan to make extensive use of historic preservation tax credits to fund their project. This form of developer welfare, besides being inefficient, is largely hidden from public view.

    According to Allen Bell, Wichita’s Director of Urban Development, the project’s team, which is lead by David Burk, plans to tap $3.8 million in state tax credits and $3.5 million in federal tax credits, for a total of $7.3 million in this form of subsidy.

    Tax credits may be a mystery to many, but there is no doubt as to their harmful effect on state and federal budgets. When using tax credits, the government, conceptually, issues a slip of paper that says something like “The holder of this document may submit it instead of $500,000 when making a tax payment.”

    This is a direct cost to the government, according to both reason and the Kansas Division of Legislative Post Audit. Last year, after conducting an audit of Kansas tax credit programs, auditors explained: “Tax credits, which the government offers to try to induce certain actions by the taxpayer, reduce income tax revenues because they are subtracted directly from the amount of taxes due.” (emphasis added)

    The audit found that in 2001, when the Kansas historic preservation tax credit program was started, the anticipated cost to the state was about $1 million per year. By 2007, the actual cost to the state was reported at almost $8.5 million.

    Further, the audit found what many already knew: tax credit aren’t an efficient way of transferring subsidy to developers. Most of the time, the developers sell the credits to someone else at a discount, as the audit explains: “The Historic Preservation Tax Credit isn’t cost-effective. That credit works differently than the other three because the amount of money a historic preservation project receives from the credit is dependent upon the amount of money it’s sold for. Our review showed that, on average, when Historic Preservation Credits were transferred to generate money for a project, they only generated 85 cents for the project for every dollar of potential tax revenue the State gave up.”

    The audit concluded this is not efficient: “That’s not a cost-effective means of generating funds for these projects because 15% of the money gets pulled out and never actually goes for preservation activities.”

    (Besides this efficiency problem the audit also found that the Kansas Department of Revenue was not accurately tracking the tax credits after their issue. See Kansas historic preservation tax credits audit reveals inefficiency, data problems.)

    In the case of the Douglas Place project in Wichita, the inefficiencies that Legislative Post Audit found are present. According to Bell, the developers plan to sell the tax credits for 87 cents on the dollar. So they’re doing a bit better than the average project.

    Still, Kansas taxpayers will give up $3.8 million in tax revenue in order to give Burk and his team about $3.3 million cash. Federal taxpayers will give up $3.5 million in order to give Burk $3 million.

    And it is a gift. It’s not an exemption from paying property or sales taxes, or letting a hotel keep 75 percent of the guest tax it generates, or tax increment financing for a garage, or the state charging customers extra sales tax that the hotel keeps, or sweetheart lease deals. Burk and his partners are getting all that, too.

    The tax credits stand out as a direct transfer of money from taxpayers to private parties. But being accomplished through the tax system shrouds the process in mystery. And, no direct action is required by any legislative body. The tax credit program is in place. The developer applies, and if accepted, the credits are granted. No one — at least no one elected by and accountable to voters — votes to grant the specific credits.

    The historic preservation tax credit program, in a short time, has grown from a program designed to help spruce up a few old buildings here and there to a developer welfare program on steroids. The Drury Plaza Hotel Broadview in downtown Wichita benefited from this program too, costing Kansas taxpayers over $4 million to pay for its tax credits, and that’s on top of other forms of subsidy.

  • For Wichita’s David Burk, subsidy machine is working again

    For Wichita real estate developer David Burk of Marketplace Properties, being on the receiving end of sweetheart lease deals with the City of Wichita is becoming a habit.

    According to a letter of intent approved by the city council — and sure to become law after a public hearing at a meeting of the Wichita City Council on September 13th — the city is planning to build about 8,500 square feet of retail space in a downtown parking garage. The garage is being built, partly, to serve a hotel Burk and partners are developing.

    Here are the details of the deal Burk and his partners are getting from the taxpayers of Wichita: The city plans to lease this space to Burk and $1.00 per year. Not $1.00 per square foot, but $1.00 for the entire space — all 8,500 square feet.

    That’s the plan for the first five years. For the next 10, the city would charge $21,000 rent per year, which is a rate of about $2.50 per square foot.

    For years 15 through 20, the rent increases to $63,000, or $7.41 per square foot. At the end of this period, Burk will have the option of purchasing the space for $1,120,000, which is a cost of about $132 per square foot.

    That cost of $132 per square foot is within the range of what sources in the real estate industry tell me top-quality retail space costs to build in Wichita, which is from $130 to $140 per square foot. Rents asked for that space would be from $15 to $18 per square foot per year.

    Using the low figure, Burk could expect to collect about $127,500 in annual rent on space he rents for $1.00, leaving a gross profit of $127,499 for him. As the $15 rent is a net figure, Burk’s tenants will pay taxes, insurance, and maintenance.

    As part of the Douglas Place Project, Burk and his partners will collect millions in the form of tax increment financing, forgiveness of property and sales taxes, capture of their hotel guest tax, community improvement district sales taxes, and historic preservation tax credits. This sweetheart lease is another layer in the cake — a very tall, many-layered cake of subsidies the city is baking for Burk.

    While most citizens might be shocked at the many layers of subsidy offered to Burk, he’s accustomed to such treatment. In 2003, the city offered a similar deal to Burk and his partners for retail space that is part of the Old Town Cinema project. That deal was made with Cinema Old Town, LLC, whose resident agent is David Burk. According to the Wichita Eagle, other partners in this corporation include Wichita theater owner Bill Warren, real estate agent Steven Barrett, Key Construction and seven others.

    David Wells, one of the owners of Key Construction, is a partner with Burk on the new hotel project, and Key is slated to build the garage under a process that doesn’t require competitive bidding, even though city money is used to pay for it.

    The Old Town project let Burk and his partners lease 17,500 square feet of retail space from the City of Wichita for $1.00 per year for the first five years. Like the proposed project, that’s not $1.00 per square foot, but $1.00 per year for all 17,500 square feet.

    Today this retail space probably rents for $15 to $18 per square foot, according to sources in the real estate industry. This means that Burk collected perhaps from $262,500 to $315,000 per year in rent. We don’t know the actual number, but it was likely in this ballpark. He had expenses, but not the main expense that most landlords face: the cost of the capital they have invested in their property. Burk had none of that expense, except for $1.00 per year.

    Like the proposed deal, the rent Burk pays for the Old Town space increased over time. For the second five years the agreement calls for Burk to pay $5.00 per square foot to the city. For the third five years, the rate rises to $7.50.

    Despite this sweetheart deal, Burk decided his property taxes were too high, and he appealed those taxes in a way the Wichita Eagle described as deceptive.

    It’s no wonder Burk and his wife regularly make generous campaign contributions to almost all city council members, regardless of their political stances. He’s developed an efficient machine, and its machinery expose all the problems with crony capitalism and the problem of concentrated benefits and dispersed costs as revealed by public choice economics.

    But I don’t think these problems bother the mayor, city council members (except for Michael O’Donnell), or city hall bureaucrats. For them — and most of all for Burk — it’s a process that worked once, and appears to be on the road to working again.

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Monday August 15, 2011

    Kansas economic development welfare promoted. An email from the Kansas Department of Commerce Business Development department informs us that “Kansas continues to add to its incentive tool box making it an even more competitive state for business.” A link in the email leads to a list of incentives, which include (and I don’t think this is a comprehensive list): Site location assistance; customized incentive proposals (including coordinating with local officials on local development incentives); Promoting Employment Across Kansas (PEAK), which allows companies to retain up to 95 percent of the state withholding taxes their employees pay; wind and solar bonds, paid off from the payroll withholding tax of the new jobs; Kansas Economic Opportunity Initiatives Fund, providing zero percent interest forgivable loans (if the loan is forgivable, why does it carry interest, I wonder); industrial revenue bonds which allow companies to escape paying property and sales taxes; community development block grants; partnership fund; Kansas Bioscience Authority; Investments in Major Projects and Comprehensive Training (IMPACT), Kansas Industrial Training (KIT), and Kansas Industrial Retraining (KIR), which pay for the employee training needs of companies; enterprise zone program; High Performance Incentive Program (HPIP); machinery and equipment property tax exemption; property tax abatements; sales tax exemptions; and machinery and equipment expensing deduction. … Missing from this list is the formation of the Job Creation Program Fund, which is a slush fund under control of the governor and Department of Commerce. And as the email message promoted, some of these programs have been expanded due to action of the recent Legislature. … There are perhaps one or two of these measures that conform to free market and economic freedom principles. The remainder amount to the state taking an “active investor” role in economic development, as explained in Embracing Dynamism: The Next Phase in Kansas Economic Development Policy by Dr. Art Hall, and reported on in Kansas economic growth policy should embrace dynamism. … Looking forward: Kansas officials — starting at the top with Kansas Governor Sam Brownback — want to reduce or eliminate the Kansas income tax in order to make the state more competitive for business. Will we then be able to eliminate all these incentives and the bureaucrats who promote and administer them?

    ‘Birth of Freedom’ screening. Tonight (Monday August 15th) the film The Birth of Freedom will be shown for free in Wichita. The film is a product of the Acton Institute, whose mission statement describes the institute as “[promoting] a free and virtuous society characterized by individual liberty and sustained by religious principles.” This free event is Monday from 7:00 pm to 8:30 pm at the Lionel D. Alford Library located at 3447 S. Meridian in Wichita. The library is just north of the I-235 exit on Meridian. The event’s sponsor is Americans for Prosperity, Kansas. For more information on this event contact John Todd at john@johntodd.net or 316-312-7335, or Susan Estes, AFP Field Director at sestes@afphq.org or 316-681-4415. … I’ve been told by those who have viewed the film that it is a very moving presentation.

    Kansas Republicans meet. At its summer meeting in Wichita, the Kansas Republican Party establishment warmed up to tea party and grassroots ideas and concepts, according to reporting by Paul Soutar at Kansas Watchdog. As an example, delegates approved a resolution rejecting all aspects of Obamacare (a tea party agenda), instead of an alternative resolution by GOP Chair Amanda Adkins, who represents the establishment Republicans in Kansas. … Earlier reporting by Soutar (Ideology, Political Reality Split State GOP on Health Care ) illustrated the division between the establishment and the tea party and grassroots wings of the party over health care, particularly the early innovator grant that Kansas recently rejected.

    Wichita City Council. The Wichita City Council in its Tuesday meeting will consider these items: Repair or removal of two unsafe structures and a conditional use permit for a nightclub which the Metropolitan Area Planning Commission rejected. The council will consider final approval of an ordinance regulating seasonal haunted house attractions, even though the need for this seems nonexistent. … The council also considers a letter of intent for Hospital Facilities Improvement and Refunding Revenue Bonds to benefit Via Christi Health System, Inc. These bond are similar to industrial revenue bonds. In each case, the city is not the lender, and it does not guarantee the creditworthiness of the bonds. In the case of IRBs, the benefit is that the borrow generally escapes paying property taxes, and also perhaps sales taxes too. But as a non-profit entity, Via Christi would not pay these taxes. … The council will receive a quarterly financial report for the quarter ending in June. … As always, the agenda packet is available at Wichita city council agendas.

    Kansas values to be topic of speech. This Friday’s meeting (August 19th) of the Wichita Pachyderm Club features Jay M. Price, Ph.D., Associate Professor and Director of the public history program at Wichita State University, speaking on “Clashes of Values in Kansas History.” His recent Wichita Eagle op-ed was Kansas a stage for “values showdowns.” In that column, he wrote “The most visceral conflicts in our society arise when deeply held values are at odds. Time and again, Kansas has been a visible stage for such ‘values showdowns.’” The column closed with: “Picking just one value, such as freedom or liberty or private property, without the desire for a law-abiding society that embraces civil rights for all can lead to very unpleasant consequences, and vice versa. However, if we struggle with these ideals, the result can be akin to a suspension bridge that functions precisely because there are numerous forces put in opposition to one another, resulting in a strong, stable structure.” … The public is welcome and encouraged to attend Wichita Pachyderm meetings. For more information click on Wichita Pachyderm Club … Upcoming speakers: On August 26, Kansas State Representatives Jim Howell and Joseph Scapa speaking on “Our freshmen year in the Kansas Legislature.” … On September 2 the Petroleum Club is closed for the holiday, so there will be no meeting. … On September 9, Mark Masterson, Director, Sedgwick County Department of Corrections, on the topic “Juvenile Justice System in Sedgwick County.” Following, from 2:00 pm to 3:00 pm, Pachyderm Club members and guests are invited to tour the Sedgwick County Juvenile Detention Center located at 700 South Hydraulic, Wichita, Kansas. … On September 16, Merrill Eisenhower Atwater, great grandson of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, will present a program with the topic to be determined. … On September 23, Dave Trabert, President of Kansas Policy Institute, speaking on the topic Why Not Kansas,” an initiative to provide information about school choice. … On September 30, U.S. Representative Mike Pompeo of Wichita on “An update from Washington.”

    Libertarianism explained. Dr. Stephen Davies of the Institute for Humane Studies explains in this short video message the basic ideas behind libertarian political philosophy: “[Libertarians] also argue that human beings are ultimately autonomous, self-defined, choosing individuals. And the kind of social order which is most conducive to the widest and most diverse range of human flourishing is one in which the role and power of government is kept to the minimum. Now this does not mean, however, that they need support a particular moral code or anything like that. It’s perfectly possible for someone who is a traditional Christian, someone who is a complete atheist, to both be libertarian in the way I’ve just described.” He listed policy issues that libertarians support, if they are being consistent: Free markets, free trade, free movement of people, free speech, constitutional and limited government, and opposition to coercive paternalism. But, for some policy positions, the libertarian position is not as clear and there can be disagreement. Foreign policy and abortion were mentioned as two such areas. Davies also addresses the accusation that libertarianism is an irrelevant political creed. … This video is from LearnLiberty.org, a project of Institute for Humane Studies, and many other informative videos are available.

  • Sweatshops best alternative for some workers

    From April, 2010.

    While sweatshops are not the place most Americans would choose to work, they are often the best alternative available to workers in some countries. Pay is low compared to U.S. standards because worker productivity is low, and the process of economic development will lead to increases in productivity and pay. But most policies promoted to help the purported plight of sweatshop workers actually lead to harm.

    That’s the message of Benjamin Powell, who spoke to a group of university students and citizens last night in Emporia on the topic “In Praise of Sweatshops.” Powell is a professor of economics at Suffolk University in Boston and is affiliated with The Beacon Hill Institute. His appearance was part of the Emporia State University “Lectures on Liberty” series.

    “Often when people say there’s something wrong with sweatshops, implicitly what they’re saying is ‘while this is bad, the alternative must be better.’ Often the alternatives in these countries are much, much worse.” The alternatives are often subsistence agriculture and working in farm fields, Powell said.

    A sweatshop, according to Powell, is a workplace with low wages (compared to U.S. standards), and poor, possibly unsafe, working conditions and benefits, again compared to U.S. standards. The sweatshops that Powell is defending are those where people voluntarily choose to work. Sweatshops where workers are forced to work under the threat of violence constitute slave labor, which cannot be defended. These are not better than the alternatives available to the forced workers, the evidence being that the workers are forced to work in these sweatshops.

    As evidence of non-sweatshop working conditions is some countries, Powell mentioned the case of a Cambodian girl and her working conditions, as reported by Nicholas D. Kristof in the New York Times in 2004:

    Nhep Chanda is a 17-year-old girl who is one of hundreds of Cambodians who toil all day, every day, picking through the dump for plastic bags, metal cans and bits of food. The stench clogs the nostrils, and parts of the dump are burning, producing acrid smoke that blinds the eyes.

    The scavengers are chased by swarms of flies and biting insects, their hands are caked with filth, and those who are barefoot cut their feet on glass. Some are small children.

    Nhep Chanda averages 75 cents a day for her efforts. For her, the idea of being exploited in a garment factory — working only six days a week, inside instead of in the broiling sun, for up to $2 a day — is a dream.

    Generally, sweatshop workers are paid much more than most other workers in the country, and their working conditions are much better. Powell mentioned that working inside — rather than outside — is very desirable in most countries. The fact that sweatshops pay higher wages and have better working conditions than the workers’ alternatives is important to remember.

    Powell explained the factors that determine how much workers are paid. The upper bound that employers are willing to pay workers is based on the amount of value that a worker can create. In economic terms, this is called the marginal productivity of labor.

    The lower bound, the minimum employers can pay, is the value of workers’ next best alternative.

    If we want to increase the earnings of sweatshop workers, we have to create policies that raise both the upper and lower bounds, Powell said, adding that about three-fourths of the variation in earnings across countries is explained by the upper bound. This points to the importance of increasing worker productivity.

    In one debate, Powell said his opponent wanted to take the question of sweatshop wages off the table, admitting that pay is higher in them. Instead, she wanted to focus on worker health and safety. But it’s important to remember, Powell told the audience, that working conditions, even those related to health and safety, are part of a total compensation package. Wages and working conditions are interconnected and can’t be separated.

    Sometimes people ask why apparel companies — the largest users of sweatshops — can’t simply pay the workers more, pointing to large profits and highly paid executives at these companies. But Powell said that apparel companies usually aren’t excessively profitable.

    Additionally, businesses are not charities. Forcing them to pay workers more means that companies will begin to look at ways to reduce the amount of labor they use. They may replace workers with machines, or use more productive workers in other countries. The result is sweatshop workers will lose their jobs.

    Powell reminded the audience that it’s important to remember that in most countries where sweatshops are used, these jobs are much better — both in terms of pay and working conditions — than what the workers face as alternatives. Anything that causes companies to shut down sweatshops or employ fewer workers, then, means that workers lose these better jobs and return to harder work at lower wages, or perhaps no work at all.

    In discussing the anti-sweatshop movement, Powell said that some groups sincerely want to help sweatshop workers, but don’t understand the economic realities in sweatshop-using countries. But labor unions such as UNITE do understand economics. The policies they advocate to help sweatshop workers — international labor standards and minimum or “living” wages, for example — increase the cost of sweatshop labor, causing companies to use less of it. It also makes unionized garment workers more attractive, and may lead to more employment in developed countries like the United States.

    “So unions advocate this not out of love for third world workers. They do it quite maliciously, actually, to unemploy third world workers for the benefit of already relatively wealthy union members in the United States and Western Europe countries.”

    The worst thing that advocates for sweatshop workers can do is to call for boycotts of products produced in sweatshops. If a boycott decreases demand for a product, the company must reduce its price, and the upper bound of what sweatshop workers can earn goes down. Then workers either have their wages reduced, or they lose their jobs.

    Powell presented the results of his research examining sweatshop wages. In many countries that use sweatshops, wages are very low, compared to U.S. wages. But that isn’t the appropriate comparison. Instead, when comparing the wages of sweatshop workers to the average income in the workers’ own country, we find that sweatshop workers do very well, often earning from two to seven times as much as the average worker in each country.

    Powell said that “ethical branding” is an idea that might help sweatshop workers. This is a marketing strategy where a company uses the fact that products are produced in sweatshops as a way to increase demand and prices. This, in turn, would increase the demand for sweatshop workers and increase their wages. But this has to be a voluntary strategy, Powell said. Companies must see this as a business success. If it is not successful in increasing demand but companies are forced to implement this strategy, it will lead to less sweatshop employment.

    Also, demand — in terms of the number of units sold — must not fall. This is a problem with “fair trade” coffee, where people purchase less of the more expensive fair trade coffee.

    The real solution for improving sweatshop wages and working conditions, Powell said, is the process of economic development. Sweatshops existed in Great Britain and the United States at one time. As capital is accumulated, better technologies are developed, and workers become more educated, workers become more productive and earn more, both in income and better working conditions.

    This process took over a century in the U.S., but countries like Hong Kong, Singapore, and South Korea, which were sweatshop countries in the 1950s and 1960s, made very rapid improvements in wages and working conditions. Capital and technology is available from abroad, Powell said, and this process can be repeated. But anti-sweatshop policies risk stalling this development, resulting in a permanent sweatshop country with low incomes.

    The real question, Powell said, is not why some countries are poor, but why some countries are rich. Rule of law, respect for property rights, and respect for individual liberty and economic freedom are policies that promote rapid economic growth. Countries that do not have these stagnate and do not increase their standard of living.

    In conclusion, Powell said that sweatshop wages and working conditions are better than what many workers face as alternatives, and that’s why people voluntarily choose to work in them. While wages are low compared to developed countries, this is because productivity is low. The process of economic development is the way to raise productivity and wages. Much of the work of anti-sweatshop groups risks undermining the economic development processes that will raise living standards.

    A question from the audience asked about the proliferation of sweatshops abroad leading to the loss of American jobs. Powell replied that sweatshops lead to the decline of the American apparel industry. But it is in the interest of America, he said, to get garments at lower cost overseas, freeing up high-skilled U.S. labor and capital to do what we’re relatively better at. This increases the wealth of America.

    Another question referred to the human costs of sweatshop labor, contrasting those workers to Nike executives who earn millions. What is the cost in terms of damage to human dignity? Powell replied that businesses are not charities, and they don’t pay executives high salaries simply because they want to. The extremely high pay of the top executive serves as an incentive for underlings to work harder in jobs that are hard to observe quality of effort. Most people do not understand this, Powell said.

    He also said that if we’re concerned about the dignity of sweatshop workers in third world countries, we should be even more concerned about those who don’t have sweatshop jobs. These people either have no jobs, or jobs with much lower pay and worse working conditions than sweatshop workers.

    Another question asked if it would help the economies of third world countries if we simply raised the wages of sweatshop workers, referring to companies that are making millions in profits. Powell said that laws mandating higher wages will change the behavior of sweatshop companies, resulting in a loss of sweatshop jobs. But voluntary programs like ethical branding could work.

    Related material on this topic by Powell includes a Christian Science Monitor op-ed Don’t get into a lather over sweatshops, a working paper titled Sweatshops and Third World Living Standards: Are the Jobs Worth the Sweat?, and an article In Defense of “Sweatshops.”

    The ESU Lectures on Liberty was conceived by Greg Schneider, professor of History at Emporia State University, to bring in important academics who support the idea of research and scholarship on critical issues regarding liberty in American history. The lecture series is underwritten by the Fred C. and Mary R. Koch Foundation in Wichita.