Not
that it was unexpected. In fact, anybody with sense could predict that the move
was going to happen. Although the ideologues of our society are going to be
more than willing to concoct their own reasons to appease themselves.
FOR
THE RECORD, Office Depot, Inc., let it be known that their corporate headquarters
will be in Boca Raton, Fla. –the city where Office Depot had been.
Office
Max had its corporate offices in suburban Naperville, and those offices will
be abandoned. So Illinois lost a business to Florida. Some 1,600 jobs in Illinois are suspected will be lost.
Admittedly,
the company had expressed a willingness to be based in the Chicago suburbs IF
the Illinois General Assembly were to grant them certain EDGE tax credits. But
in the wake of being obsessed with approving a measure to resolve pension
funding programs, the Illinois House ignored the issue.
So
with no tax breaks, the new Office Depot chain will be a Florida-based
business.
THE
HONEST TRUTH is that this merger basically sees Office Depot take over Office
Max. So it shouldn’t be a surprise that their corporate culture will be the
predominant one in the newly-enlarged company.
It
would have been a bigger jolt if they had made the move to DuPage County. I’m
not sure that such tax credits would have been appropriate. If Office Depot,
Inc., can’t fully appreciate the benefits of being a part of metro Chicago, I’d
argue it’s their loss.
There
ought to be limits as to how far our political people go to do the equivalent
of bribing businesses to come be amongst us.
Of
course, this issue is going to crop up again, since the Decatur-based Archer
Daniels Midland company also wants the same type of tax credits. They say they
want to be in a bigger city than their current corporate home, and would like
to keep an Illinois tie by moving to Chicago.
BUT
THEY’RE DEMANDING the same EDGE tax credits, which really don’t amount to much
money toward their financial bottom line.
It
really comes down to a business entity thinking they have the right to demand
things of government, just because they can. “Corporate welfare” is the label
some people like to put on these kinds of deals, although there are times I
wonder if “corporate blackmail” is more accurate.
Yes,
there are political people who are claiming the loss of Office Depot, Inc. –
which we never really had in the first place – is evidence that we’re too inept
to hang on to ADM. They may well wind up in St. Louis or Minneapolis – although
I’d suspect the Dallas-Ft. Worth area is more likely because they have an airport
and flight connections that can compete with what’s available at O’Hare
International and Midway airports.
I
do realize that not gaining a corporate headquarters is a blow to the state. It
would have helped burnish our rep if we could have stolen it, in a sense, from
Florida. But it’s not exactly the end of the world.
PERHAPS
AS EVIDENCED by the statement Gov. Pat Quinn was able to issue Tuesday about
the boost Illinois received from the Standard & Poor’s credit rating
agency. The quality of the state’s bonds rose from “negative” to “developing.”
Having
our state Legislature get off its collective duff and act on pension funding
was a significant step in the direction of significant improvement of our state’s
economy.
“The
change reflects the consensus reached on pension reform, which we believe could
contribute to a sustainable path to fiscal stability,” Standard & Poor’s
credit analyst Robin Prunty said of Illinois.
More
sustainable than any concoction of EDGE tax credits could ever achieve for
Illinois.
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