Panthers Get Big Tax Break

[TheMaulClaw]

Just now, 1of10Charnatives said:

Do you have a citation documenting that this is indeed something St Louis has included in its lawsuit or is it just something you “think” they’re including?

If they are in fact including it I will say that it’s not something I agree they have an inherent right to unless the team is in specific breach of some existing legal contract in which the team guaranteed to generate said revenue. I’m not aware of any such arrangement ever existing between a pro sports team and a government.

In essence if true then the city is probably making a frivolous claim in that regard and the courts shouldn’t uphold it. It wouldn’t be the first time someone has thrown something into a lawsuit that they didn’t have any reasonable claim to, but that doesn’t change the fact the team is private. St  Louis does not receive regular business profit income from the team, and that is the threshold for considering them to have an ownership interest.

Have you seen how much St Louis is suing for? Over 2 billion.

[1of10Charnatives]

Just now, TheMaulClaw said:

Have you seen how much St Louis is suing for? Over 2 billion.

Have you never noticed that what is asked for in a lawsuit is borderline meaningless? What matters is what’s actually awarded. I could sue you tomorrow for a bajillion dollars. What would it mean ? 

Nothing.

[TheMaulClaw]

3 minutes ago, 1of10Charnatives said:

Do you have a citation documenting that this is indeed something St Louis has included in its lawsuit or is it just something you “think” they’re including?

If they are in fact including it I will say that it’s not something I agree they have an inherent right to unless the team is in specific breach of some existing legal contract in which the team guaranteed to generate said revenue. I’m not aware of any such arrangement ever existing between a pro sports team and a government.

In essence if true then the city is probably making a frivolous claim in that regard and the courts shouldn’t uphold it. It wouldn’t be the first time someone has thrown something into a lawsuit that they didn’t have any reasonable claim to, but that doesn’t change the fact the team is private. St  Louis does not receive regular business profit income from the team, and that is the threshold for considering them to have an ownership interest.

More importantly, since you seem to want to claim “but that doesn’t apply here cause it’s not specific to here” The Rams are not the Panthers and St Louis is not Charlotte. The Panthers are a wholly owned private business that the city has no ownership interest in.

There was an article on ESPN.com a few months ago that went into. Had to do with the stadium in LA going over budget...while simultaneously the NFL was getting sued by St Louis for losing the Rams. It broke down the lawsuit. I'll see if I can find the link.

[TheMaulClaw]

1 minute ago, 1of10Charnatives said:

Have you never noticed that what is asked for in a lawsuit is borderline meaningless? What matters is what’s actually awarded. I could sue you tomorrow for a bajillion dollars. What would it mean ? 

Nothing.

Yeah but St Louis has been winning every outing of this suit so far. Wouldnt be surprised if the NFL gave them a team back like the Chargers.

[TheMaulClaw]

8 minutes ago, 1of10Charnatives said:

Have you never noticed that what is asked for in a lawsuit is borderline meaningless? What matters is what’s actually awarded. I could sue you tomorrow for a bajillion dollars. What would it mean ? 

Nothing.

Yeah so having trouble copying pasting links rn...but just google St Louis suing NFL and you'll see a ton of articles.

[1of10Charnatives]

3 minutes ago, TheMaulClaw said:

Truly half the taxes I pay go to things that arent to my benefit. I love the Panthers...I'd rather the money go there then to some bicycle bridge or other bs.

Also why do you think these cities are forking over the money to keep their teams? You think the city gets no benefit from having the team? These teams wouldnt have the ability to play cities or states against eachother if they didnt bring something valuable to the table.  The city of Charlotte has received unprecedented exposure because of the Panthers. Not to mention the citizens have gotten an unbelievable amount of joy having the team. There are so many benefits of having the team. It may be a private company...but they provide a service that is good for the entire city...and the city knows this.

 

I get Joy from going to my favorite restaurant. Should it get a tax break because of that? Should the city build that restaurant a new location out of the public purse?

These things are all nice, but they are not unique to the Panthers and AGAIN professional economists have evaluated these things, including the value of exposure (it’s crazy the things we can now quantify) and determined that subsidizing pro sports teams is a raw deal for taxpayers.

Please, please please, do some actual research into this topic for yourself. You keep putting forward stuff that team supporters have been putting forward for literally generations and none of which has withstood actual empirical scrutiny. The bottom line is that NFL teams can not put forward a fact base argument that stands up to dispassionate third party evaluation on it’s merits. If they could, they would have long since done so, and trained professionals wouldn’t be near universal in their opinion their arguments don’t hold water. There is nothing you’ve put forward in this thread that they have not already long since considered and evaluated. Literally all you’ve done is regurgitate long debunked stuff because you haven’t done the research.

[TheMaulClaw]

5 minutes ago, 1of10Charnatives said:

I get Joy from going to my favorite restaurant. Should it get a tax break because of that? Should the city build that restaurant a new location out of the public purse?

These things are all nice, but they are not unique to the Panthers and AGAIN professional economists have evaluated these things, including the value of exposure (it’s crazy the things we can now quantify) and determined that subsidizing pro sports teams is a raw deal for taxpayers.

Please, please please, do some actual research into this topic for yourself. You keep putting forward stuff that team supporters have been putting forward for literally generations and none of which has withstood actual empirical scrutiny. The bottom line is that NFL teams can not put forward a fact base argument that stands up to dispassionate third party evaluation on it’s merits. If they could, they would have long since done so, and trained professionals wouldn’t be near universal in their opinion their arguments don’t hold water. There is nothing you’ve put forward in this thread that they have not already long since considered and evaluated. Literally all you’ve done is regurgitate long debunked stuff because you haven’t done the research.

Obviously you want the team to stay in Charlotte...but want them to have the shittiest stadium in the NFL. Yeah the guy just paid 2.2 billion cash...let's go ahead and make him pay another 2 billion for a new stadium so he can keep our team here for us. Let's not help this dude out at all...god forbid if we give him any type of tax break then hes fuging over all the citizens of Charlotte.

I mean what the hell do you want? You're not a fan.

The reality is...whether you like it or not NFL teams blur the line between public and private.

In 2008 we watch the govt bailout banks....private companies. This is the same poo. Get used to it.

[1of10Charnatives]

9 minutes ago, TheMaulClaw said:

Yeah but St Louis has been winning every outing of this suit so far. Wouldnt be surprised if the NFL gave them a team back like the Chargers.

All I can say about that lawsuit is that in principal barring some highly unusual contractural agreement between the team and the city that I doubt ever existed, I don’t agree that the city has any inherent “right” to tax revenues the teams presence may have helped generate and if the team leaves the city has automatically suffered damages as a result. If there were specific agreements the team violated that’s one thing, but if the city is just suing because “you left and it hurt our tax revenue” then I’m not on the city’s side with that, that would be absurd, and would hope that a rational judge wouldn’t award them any damage.

[1of10Charnatives]

2 minutes ago, TheMaulClaw said:

Obviously you want the team to stay in Charlotte...but want them to have the shittiest stadium in the NFL. Yeah the guy just paid 2.2 billion cash...let's go ahead and make him pay another 2 billion for a new stadium so he can keep our team here for us. Let's not help this dude out at all...god forbid if we give him any type of tax break then hes fuging over all the citizens of Charlotte.

Why does a guy worth 11 billion need my help?

He wants my money. He does not NEED my help. There’s a difference.

We are sports crazy in this country to the point of losing sight of what should be common sense priorities. Our teachers get paid embarrassing wages. The schools they work in are poorly funded, but god forbid a billionaire not get every penny he wants of public money to build some palace he’s still gonna charge me 11 bucks for poo beer inside of.

I love the Panthers. I am not willing to put that love of a past time ahead of real and significant needs in areas far more appropriate for use of public funds. You and I have agreed on at least one thing: that the way B of A was originally funded did not dip into the public purse and that made the Panthers different. My concern is that this will change going forward as it has already changed with the renovations.

At the end of the day there are things more important than sports stadiums, and some of those things are getting short shrift in part because so many of us love football.

[TheMaulClaw]

14 minutes ago, 1of10Charnatives said:

Why does a guy worth 11 billion need my help?

He wants my money. He does not NEED my help. There’s a difference.

We are sports crazy in this country to the point of losing sight of what should be common sense priorities. Our teachers get paid embarrassing wages. The schools they work in are poorly funded, but god forbid a billionaire not get every penny he wants of public money to build some palace he’s still gonna charge me 11 bucks for poo beer inside of.

I love the Panthers. I am not willing to put that love of a past time ahead of real and significant needs in areas far more appropriate for use of public funds. You and I have agreed on at least one thing: that the way B of A was originally funded did not dip into the public purse and that made the Panthers different. My concern is that this will change going forward as it has already changed with the renovations.

At the end of the day there are things more important than sports stadiums, and some of those things are getting short shrift in part because so many of us love football.

The renovations were a way to tether the team to the area for the post Richardson era.

We can blame Jerry Jones for a lot of this mega stadium bs.

In a way you could file some of this away as public works projects. They're using the MLS as an opportunity to revitalize the Eastland Mall area. I think that's great. A new stadium will provide plenty of opportunity. It will create jobs. There are benefits.

Teachers pay is a state thing not a city thing anyway...so regardless of what Charlotte contributed to the new stadium that would not be affected. Quite honestly teachers shouldnt make six figures anyway. 

[1of10Charnatives]

Just now, TheMaulClaw said:

The renovations were a way to tether the team to the area for the post Richardson era.

We can blame Jerry Jones for a lot of this mega stadium bs.

In a way you could file some of this away as public works projects. They're using the MLS as an opportunity to revitalize the Eastland Mall area. I think that's great. A new stadium will provide plenty of opportunity. It will create jobs. There are benefits.

Teachers pay is a state thing not a city thing anyway...so regardless of what Charlotte contributed to the new stadium that would not be affected. Quite honestly teachers shouldnt make six figures anyway. They should make about 50k a year considering they only work 3 quarters of the year...have weekends off and have great hours.

The teacher thing would be a whole separate discussion and we’d be getting way off base. Some of the things Tepper is doing in the community I’m a fan of and like. This isn’t a binary thing where you have to either love or hate the guy on everything.

The tethering thing was imo the team throwing the politicians who did their bidding a bone so they could say to voters “ See we didn’t just give them all that money for nothing. We got something in return.” 10 years for 87 million. I’ll gladly start a business and promise not to move it for only 5 million a year, What a bargain! Imo all it told you was that Richardson had no real intention of moving and was willing to admit so publicly in exchange for the money instead of threatening to move like every other team does when it wants something.

You keep circling back to debunked arguments like jobs and benefits. Please do some research on this subject for yourself so you can see that these things do not in sum outweigh the costs. They just don’t. I don’t know how many times I have to repeat myself. Economists have studied this. Extensively. I promise you they have taken literally everything you’ve brought up into account. This is not a new debate and you’re not thinking up things they forgot or overlooked.

[TheMaulClaw]

8 hours ago, 1of10Charnatives said:

The teacher thing would be a whole separate discussion and we’d be getting way off base. Some of the things Tepper is doing in the community I’m a fan of and like. This isn’t a binary thing where you have to either love or hate the guy on everything.

The tethering thing was imo the team throwing the politicians who did their bidding a bone so they could say to voters “ See we didn’t just give them all that money for nothing. We got something in return.” 10 years for 87 million. I’ll gladly start a business and promise not to move it for only 5 million a year, What a bargain! Imo all it told you was that Richardson had no real intention of moving and was willing to admit so publicly in exchange for the money instead of threatening to move like every other team does when it wants something.

You keep circling back to debunked arguments like jobs and benefits. Please do some research on this subject for yourself so you can see that these things do not in sum outweigh the costs. They just don’t. I don’t know how many times I have to repeat myself. Economists have studied this. Extensively. I promise you they have taken literally everything you’ve brought up into account. This is not a new debate and you’re not thinking up things they forgot or overlooked.

Equating an NFL team to a mom and pop business like a roofing company or a laundromat is just plain foolish.  

When major companies are looking to relocate or build additional factories states and cities compete to land them. They compete by offering certain breaks like infrastructure help, additional land, and/or tax breaks.

I live in Charleston. We did that with Boeing, Volvo, Mercedes, and others.

I remember speaking to a client who relocated a pharmaceutical manufacturing company here to Charleston. He told me that Haley(governor at the time) made it so enticing that they had to do it.

You're speaking like pro sports teams are the only ones getting breaks. The reality is....when an individual makes over a 2 billion dollar investment in something that helps the city...the city and state should help....and they do.The city can vehicle too many projects off of something like the Panthers for them not too.  Same goes for other big business.

(Example, do you honestly think the light rail would even be a thing if it wasnt for the Panthers? It's called the freaking C.A.T.S system.)

That's true whether it's a pro team or car or pill manufacturer.

Here in Charleston they've pretty much built an entire town around the new Volvo plant.

Does it mean that the city will help you open up your pizza place...hell no...that's little business.

Also I'm not the one who brought up teachers salaries. You did.

[1of10Charnatives]

14 minutes ago, TheMaulClaw said:

Equating an NFL team to a mom and pop business like a roofing company or a laundromat is just plain foolish.  

When major companies are looking to relocate or build additional factories states and cities compete to land them. They compete by offering certain breaks like infrastructure help, additional land, and/or tax breaks.

I live in Charleston. We did that with Boeing, Volvo, Mercedes, and others.

I remember speaking to a client who relocated a pharmaceutical manufacturing company here to Charleston. He told me that Haley(governor at the time) made it so enticing that they had to do it.

You're speaking like pro sports teams are the only ones getting breaks. The reality is....when an individual makes over a 2 billion dollar investment in something that helps the city...the city and state should help....and they do.The city can vehicle too many projects off of something like the Panthers for them not too.  Same goes for other big business.

(Example, do you honestly think the light rail would even be a thing if it wasnt for the Panthers? It's called the freaking C.A.T.S system.)

That's true whether it's a pro team or car or pill manufacturer.

Here in Charleston they've pretty much built an entire town around the new Volvo plant.

Does it mean that the city will help you open up your pizza place...hell no...that's little business.

Also I'm not the one who brought up teachers salaries. You did.

It's exactly true, and it's exactly the problem. You're talking like because every big business does it, it's okay. I'm not saying the Panthers shouldn't get this treatment and Google or Boeing should, I'm saying none of them should. Why would I take this position? Several reasons. These tax breaks create a real and significant competitive advantage for large businesses over small competitors. Every economist worth a damn will tell you that it is small business, not big business, that are the drivers of job creation and economic growth. Heck even the very politicians who are giving away tax breaks to sports teams and fortune 500 companies talk constantly out of the other side of their mouth about how small business is the backbone of the economy. They say it's the backbone, but they treat it like the tailbone by giving larger competitors a baked in advantage.

In doing so, they are, by their own words, and in the opinion of economic experts, doing the exact opposite of what they purport to do, which is stimulating economic growth because this creates a disadvantage for small business, which is the greater driver of growth and job creation.  When Boeing or Google or whatever relocates to a specific city or state because of the tax breaks, yes, that brings jobs to that specific location, but it does not actually create new jobs, just relocates existing ones. In this way large businesses have learned to pit cities and states against each other to create bidding wars to host them. The incentives that politicians give away to them are not magically created out of thin air, they go against tax revenues that would otherwise be created and then one of the two things must happen: either everyone else pays more in taxes to make up the difference or government budgets must be cut. This is because when the big business relocates, it doesn't pay it's share of taxes, but it does create sizable additional needs for government services in the form of infractructure etc.

The reason I didn't break up those others businesses is because this forum is Panthers specific, not general business and economy. The reason I used the example of a mom and pop business is not foolish, but to highlight the absurdity of the notion that government would ever do this for individuals and small businesses. We know it would not, therefore government in taking this action is de facto favoring big existing businesses, which are all things being equal, known to stifle innovation and competition in the marketplace, because those things threaten the status quo which has them at the top. Innovation and competition are good for the consumer but bad for big business. In this way the government by supporting big businesss is actually working against your interests as a consumer and a citizen, and giving your hard earned tax dollars away to do it.

Look at it this way: Boeing, Google and the Panthers have to locate somewhere right? Do you think it is better for anyone who is not Boeing, Google or the Panthers that wherever they locate give them enormous tax breaks just for the privilege of them being there if they are going to be there anyway? The bidding war big businesses have become adept at creating for something they have to do anyway creates a benefit to them only. If state and local governments were outlawed from giving tax breaks to individual specific businesses (something I highly support), all of those businesses would still be located somewhere, but would have to base that decision on competitive factors that are fair and not at public expense, such as quality of infractructure, schools, general quality of life there. If cities and states were forced to compete on these factors alone, you might find that instead of simply handing your tax money to Google, they might actually put more effort into making the place where you live more appealing in ways that are more to your benefit than just lining Google's pockets.

I have mentioned the Prisoner's dilemma in this discussion. If you are not familiar with it, please read up on it to understand how these large businesses use this mechanism to extract tax breaks from local governments in a way that does not provide any tangible benefit to the taxpayer, other than determining where they locate, which they have to do anyway. 

Remember the St Louis lawsuit? If the city actually wins damages, and again I have not yet had the chance to read up on it, but if they do I will bet you dollars to donuts it will be because the team made promises about it's economic impact in terms of things like job creation etc that it measurably failed to deliver on. 

 

[TheMaulClaw]

16 minutes ago, 1of10Charnatives said:

It's exactly true, and it's exactly the problem. You're talking like because every big business does it, it's okay. I'm not saying the Panthers shouldn't get this treatment and Google or Boeing should, I'm saying none of them should. Why would I take this position? Several reasons. These tax breaks create a real and significant competitive advantage for large businesses over small competitors. Every economist worth a damn will tell you that it is small business, not big business, that are the drivers of job creation and economic growth. Heck even the very politicians who are giving away tax breaks to sports teams and fortune 500 companies talk constantly out of the other side of their mouth about how small business is the backbone of the economy. They say it's the backbone, but they treat it like the tailbone by giving larger competitors a baked in advantage.

In doing so, they are, by their own words, and in the opinion of economic experts, doing the exact opposite of what they purport to do, which is stimulating economic growth because this creates a disadvantage for small business, which is the greater driver of growth and job creation.  When Boeing or Google or whatever relocates to a specific city or state because of the tax breaks, yes, that brings jobs to that specific location, but it does not actually create new jobs, just relocates existing ones. In this way large businesses have learned to pit cities and states against each other to create bidding wars to host them. The incentives that politicians give away to them are not magically created out of thin air, they go against tax revenues that would otherwise be created and then one of the two things must happen: either everyone else pays more in taxes to make up the difference or government budgets must be cut. This is because when the big business relocates, it doesn't pay it's share of taxes, but it does create sizable additional needs for government services in the form of infractructure etc.

The reason I didn't break up those others businesses is because this forum is Panthers specific, not general business and economy. The reason I used the example of a mom and pop business is not foolish, but to highlight the absurdity of the notion that government would ever do this for individuals and small businesses. We know it would not, therefore government in taking this action is de facto favoring big existing businesses, which are all things being equal, known to stifle innovation and competition in the marketplace, because those things threaten the status quo which has them at the top. Innovation and competition are good for the consumer but bad for big business. In this way the government by supporting big businesss is actually working against your interests as a consumer and a citizen, and giving your hard earned tax dollars away to do it.

Look at it this way: Boeing, Google and the Panthers have to locate somewhere right? Do you think it is better for anyone who is not Boeing, Google or the Panthers that wherever they locate give them enormous tax breaks just for the privilege of them being there if they are going to be there anyway? The bidding war big businesses have become adept at creating for something they have to do anyway creates a benefit to them only. If state and local governments were outlawed from giving tax breaks to individual specific businesses (something I highly support), all of those businesses would still be located somewhere, but would have to base that decision on competitive factors that are fair and not at public expense, such as quality of infractructure, schools, general quality of life there. If cities and states were forced to compete on these factors alone, you might find that instead of simply handing your tax money to Google, they might actually put more effort into making the place where you live more appealing in ways that are more to your benefit than just lining Google's pockets.

I have mentioned the Prisoner's dilemma in this discussion. If you are not familiar with it, please read up on it to understand how these large businesses use this mechanism to extract tax breaks from local governments in a way that does not provide any tangible benefit to the taxpayer, other than determining where they locate, which they have to do anyway. 

Remember the St Louis lawsuit? If the city actually wins damages, and again I have not yet had the chance to read up on it, but if they do I will bet you dollars to donuts it will be because the team made promises about it's economic impact in terms of things like job creation etc that it measurably failed to deliver on. 

 

I'm in sales right. I sale a lot to Boeing employees. Any small incremental tax increase is worth it to me because I get access to a market that helps me make a living. While small business may create a lot of jobs...often they're worse jobs in terms of income and benefits unless it's like a small accounting firm, attorney, or Drs office.

Also a company like Boeing or Volvo isnt stifling any innovation or small business. It helps them. How many small business do you know of that manufacture planes or vehicles. It helps the roofers and maid companies of the world by bringing in viable clientele. 

What small business does the NFL stifle? Rec mens flag football?  It also helps small business owners. I guarantee you locally owned restaurants and dive bars dont want to see the Panthers leave.

My best friends is a great musician who also DJs. He DJs every Sunday during football season. The Panthers created that gig for him. That's not exactly hurting his small business.

I get what you're saying regarding let's say WalMart. But Boeing...Volvo...The Panthers....no way.