Illinois Gains Jobs at Indiana’s Expense

Some very odd things are happening in the state of Illinois right now. The state recently approved a tax break that was designed to help keep companies in the state during the current economic downturn. While most companies would see a tax break as a beneficial thing and it would make them want to stay in the are, two different large organizations are considering it as an incentive to move on to another location and one company is robbing another state to bring jobs here. If all of that is very confusing to you then read on and hopefully we can shed some light on our confusion.

The two companies in question are Sears Holdings Corporation and the Chicago financial exchange. They are both making threats about leaving the state after these tax breaks were instated to keep them around. This created some serious doubts about whether or not the idea of giving big companies tax breaks in order to keep jobs in the local area is really the best use of the dollars that the state has allocated to the development and repair of the local economy.

Those concerns were added to by a recent shift in personnel made by Navistar International Corporation in the recent weeks. The company has a agreement with the state to bring in new jobs, which was expected and welcome, but recently local reporters have discovered that the jobs are being created at the expense of other workers, union workers in the state of Indiana.

The deal which is good for Illinois workers, was actually made last year went something like this. The company made threats to leave the state in search of greener pastures. In order to keep them in the state Governor Pat Quinn offered them an incentive package, which included $64.7 million in training and tax credits for the company. In exchange the company was obliged to not only stay in the state, but also to bring in 400 new jobs and those jobs had to be full time.

It sounds like a win-win situation right? Well it is, unless you are a worker in Indiana. Workers there, who are being laid off are being used to train the incoming workers. They, for obvious reasons feel that the move is unfair.

One worker,  a Mr. Craig Randolph, who worked as a design engineer the company for 15 years prior to his layoff, told a reporter for WBEZ that the company has, “rewritten the job descriptions so the people that used to do the work here — the union folks — don’t qualify anymore on paper. So they’re eliminating the high-seniority, older employees like myself and replacing them with nonunion college kids — guys fresh out of school. And the taxpayers in Illinois are subsidizing the whole thing.”

Currently no reports are due for the effectiveness of the jobs program in the state of Illinois for some time. When the reports are made in 2012 the state will be able to see if the economic incentive plan is actually working and how many new jobs have been brought to the state by this plan.