Did you see this editorial about your CT tax $$$ ?

May 26, 2016

Please share the attached Waterbury Republican-American editorial about how your CT tax dollars are being spent:

(May 26 Editorial, Waterbury Republican-American)

Gift to hedge fund

‘Santa’ Malloy on wrong path

Connecticut government is on the verge of playing Santa Claus to Westport-based Bridgewater Associates, the largest hedge fund in the world.

Bridgewater is expected to receive $52 million in economic benefits.

This development comes on the heels of an aborted $115 million deal under which Bridgewater would have moved its headquarters to Stamford. Gov. Dannel P. Malloy and Catherine Smith, commissioner of the Department of Economic and Community Development, have touted the new package, claiming it is vital to Connecticut’s economic future.

Unfortunately, the Bridgewater affair highlights the cluelessness of Gov. Malloy and Commissioner Smith.

Connecticut’s long-troubled economy is unlikely to improve as long as their thinking carries the day at the Capitol.

To ensure Connecticut’s economic success, policymakers would generate the best results by establishing an environment in which all businesses can thrive. The Bridgewater package won’t do that.

To the contrary, it simply will paper over the economic problems caused by decades of business-unfriendly state policies.

Friday, the State Bond Commission — of which Gov. Malloy is ex officio chairman — is set to approve a $17 million, 10-year loan to Bridgewater for infrastructure improvements. If Bridgewater retains its 1,402 positions in Connecticut and creates 750 new jobs by 2021, the state will forgive the 1 percent interest loan. (Other aspects of the package include $5 million in grants for job training and the installation of alternative energy systems; and $30 million in tax credits, according to news reports.) As we put it in a similarly themed editorial published last Aug. 26, “If buying jobs is the basis for a state’s economic strategy, the state is fundamentally uncompetitive.” The Bridgewater package won’t fundamentally change Connecticut’s economic equation, Gov. Malloy’s and Ms. Smith’s spin notwithstanding.

Connecticut needs a full-scale course correction.

Policymakers must drop their knee-jerk tendency to tax, spend, mandate, coddle public-employee unions and craft cobbled-together budgets.

That is unlikely to happen soon.

Gov. Malloy and the Democrats who control the legislature built a 2016-17 budget that is fundamentally flawed and earned the state two credit-rating downgrades last week.

This year, legislators considered proposals to increase the minimum wage and mandate paid family leave.

These proposals weren’t adopted, but as we have noted, simple consideration of them signaled tone deafness on the part of lawmakers.

Only when the Capitol changes hands will Connecticut have the business-friendly atmosphere that is conducive to gaining good-paying jobs.

That will allow the state to, finally, mount a full recovery from the 2008-10 Great Recession. The Sunday Republican reported on Connecticut’s lackluster recovery May 22.