Economic Differences Between Texas And Ohio Illustrate The Problems With Liberal Leadership
Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are spending a lot of time on the campaign trail in the lead up votes in Texas and Ohio railing against free trade agreements and promising massive new tax packages for “big business.” What’s interesting, however, is that Texas and Ohio illustrate perfectly why protectionism and big government are bad for business.
In Ohio, big taxes and intrusive government are driving jobs out of the state. In Texas, a business-friendly atmosphere and low taxes are bringing businesses, and jobs, into the state.
Let’s start with the fact that Texas’s growth puts the lie to the myth that free trade costs American jobs. Anti-Nafta rhetoric doesn’t play well in El Paso, San Antonio and Houston, which have become gateway cities for commerce with Latin America and have flourished since the North American Free Trade Agreement passed Congress in 1993. Mr. Obama’s claim of one million lost jobs due to trade deals is laughable in Texas, the state most affected by Nafta. Texas has gained 36,000 manufacturing jobs since 2004 and has ranked as the nation’s top exporting state for six years in a row. Its $168 billion of exports in 2007 translate into tens of thousands of jobs. . . .
Ohio Governor Ted Strickland, a Democrat who supports Mrs. Clinton, blames his state’s problems on President Bush. But Ohio’s economy has been struggling for years, and most of its wounds are self-inflicted. Ohio now ranks 47th out of 50 in economic competitiveness, according to the American Legislative Exchange Council. Ohio politicians deplore plant closings even as they impose the third highest corporate income tax in the country (10.5%) and the sixth highest personal income tax (8.87%). A common joke is that Ohio lays out the red carpet for companies—when they leave the state. By contrast, Texas has no income tax, a huge competitive advantage.
Ohio’s most crippling handicap may be that its politicians—and thus its employers—are still in the grip of such industrial unions as the United Auto Workers. Ohio is a “closed shop” state, which means workers can be forced to join a union whether they wish to or not. Many companies—especially foreign-owned—say they will not even consider such locations for new sites. States with “right to work” laws that make union organizing more difficult had twice the job growth of Ohio and other forced union states from 1995-2005, according to the National Institute for Labor Relations.
For all the carping Democrats do about the plight of the American worker it’s ironic that the very policies they promote are what lead to that plight.
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