Foxconn to Wisconsin is win for the president, right?

MADISON - Foxconn Technology Group announced at the White House Wednesday its plans to invest $10 billion to build a massive display panel plant in Wisconsin that could employ up to 13,000 workers but would require up to $3 billion in subsidies from state taxpayers.

“America does not have a single LCD plant to produce a complicated system. We are going to change that," Foxconn chairman Terry Gou said at a news conference. "It starts today with this investment in Wisconsin."

The deal represents a huge opportunity for Wisconsin as well as a significant risk — one that state lawmakers will have to weigh quickly as they consider whether to allow a subsidy package nearly 50 times bigger than any previous one.

The project could reshape the economy of southeastern Wisconsin and involve not just a large factory but a virtual village, with housing, stores and service businesses — spread over at least 1,000 acres, according to Gov. Scott Walker's office and a source familiar with the deal. That acreage, an area totaling more than 1.5 square miles and roughly the size of Shorewood, could potentially could be assembled from parcels that initially weren’t contiguous, the source said.

At 20 million square feet, the factory would be three times the size of the Pentagon, making it one of the largest manufacturing campuses in the nation. It would initially employ 3,000 workers making an average of $53,900 a year.

Getting the the company to come to Wisconsin would take $1 billion to $3 billion in incentives paid over up to 15 years, sources said. At least parts of the package would be tied to job creation.

If the deal cost $1 billion and the company created 10,000 jobs, the government would spend $100,000 per job. And a $3 billion deal with that many jobs would cost $300,000 per job.

At $3 billion, the subsidies would total more than the combined yearly state funding used to operate the University of Wisconsin System and the state's prison system.

kingstonlake wrote:Any word on how much corporate welfare is involved in luring a struggling company like Apple........

Turtleneck wrote:

kingstonlake wrote:Any word on how much corporate welfare is involved in luring a struggling company like Apple........

I think Apple is one of the tech firms that has emerged as a global leader in under this administration.

kingstonlake wrote:There's no way the average workers salary will be $53,000 lol. No fucking way. Unless they are counting a $300 million salary of the CEO in that equation.

When Foxconn Technology Group begins construction of an industrial plant large enough to cover the entire Village of Shorewood, it will be exempted from state environmental requirements that any other company would have to follow.

Foxconn can fill in wetlands that are regulated by the state, change the course of streams, even build in a stream running through the property if it wants to.

In addition, the plant will use potentially polluting chemicals to manufacture an array of super-high-definition display panels. Yet no environmental impact statement will be required by state officials for one of the largest economic development projects in U.S. history.

“That was not a request that came from Foxconn,” said Tim Sheehy, president of the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce, who was involved in negotiations with the company.

It came from state officials, who believed the environmental reviews could slow the giant complex in Racine County —the plant will be three times larger than the Pentagon — and persuade the Taiwan-based company to build its liquid crystal display panel plant someplace else.

The help for Foxconn underscores how Gov. Scott Walker and fellow Republicans, since voters gave them control in 2010, have engineered the biggest shift in natural resource management in decades by easing regulations and promoting business-friendly policies.

Supporters of efforts to curtail environmental regulations point to the blockbuster deal with Foxconn and the promise of up to 13,000 jobs as a validation of tax and regulatory policies that are more welcoming to investment and job creation.

Walker and Foxconn Technology Group Chairman Terry Gou signed an agreement on Nov. 10 to provide the company with up to $3 billion in taxpayer incentives to build a plant east of I-94 in the Village of Mount Pleasant.