Governor, may I introduce you to Mr Adam Smith?
Wednesday, September 19th, 2007 By David HansenFrom yesterday’s Gongwer Report ($) on Ohio’s attempt to lure an MMK Steel Plant to Haverhill:
[Strickland] said the administration is also eager to work with existing steel companies on projects that retain and create jobs in the state. “But we also have an obligation to try to attract new investments in Ohio.”
The state will avoid putting one company at a competitive disadvantage to another one, he said. [“]But we want to encourage competition. That is the free market approach and so we think we’re doing what is reasonable, fair and just and I don’t see any reason why any existing company should feel threatened by this possible investment.”
Governor, I have served with the free market approach. I know the free market approach; the free market approach is a friend of mine. Governor, you’ve no idea what the free market approach is.
The way competition is created in the free market approach is by investors seeking profits building new businesses to compete with old. Competition created by politicians seeking votes is, well, just the politics of government picking winners and losers in our economy.
In rewarding investors with profits, the free market approach also rewards sound management, innovation, smartly-run operations and attention to customers. In short, keys to success in the 21st Century global economy. Successful, new competition through the free market approach sends the message to established companies that they need to sharpen their business practices and make the investments which improve their competitiveness and productivity.
The competition the governor speaks of, that borne of politics, rewards companies for the quality of their lobbying in securing tax and regulatory breaks, the attention they pay to their public relations campaigns to back up the lobbying, and their adeptness at playing two governments such Ohio and Quebec off of each other. In short, things good to know in getting government to give you what you want, but not for much else.
New competition of the governor’s sort signals established companies that sound business strategies, investments and execution are not enough to succeed in Ohio. Under the governor’s version of economics, a business will be more successful in Ohio by spending on a lobbyist or a PR firm than by investing in new production techniques or in product-improving R&D projects.
And that’s no way to grow prosperity in Ohio.
Tags: Competition
