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So many of my liberal colleagues like to point to our states “image” or green ranking when they are talking about big businesses leaving Wisconsin. They seem to think if we just spend tons of state money on light rail, green energy, emissions control and socialized un-”Healthy Wisconsin” healthcare we will somehow attract more talent and more businesses.

As it turns out, it’s a question of simple economics that becomes more and more evident as time passes:

“The Lone Star State passed New York as home to the most big companies in the latest list compiled by Fortune magazine.

Texas now boasts 58 headquarters, three more than New York, the previous No. 1, and California, with 52.

Business experts say it’s a matter of simple economics – Texas attracts companies with its low taxes, affordable land and large labor force.

“Cost is overwhelmingly the No. 1 driver,” said Albert W. Niemi Jr., dean of the business school at Southern Methodist University, who wrote his doctoral thesis about companies leaving the Northeast for the Sun Belt 30 years ago.”

And to preempt those who will say “oh, it’s just oil companies”:

“Other Texas companies on the magazine’s list include technology, such as Dell Inc., three of the nation’s biggest airlines, two of the biggest homebuilders, an insurer, a hospital company and the largest garbage hauler around.”

Hmm, I seem to remember some CEOs in Milwaukee blatantly stating this point:

“They said Milwaukee’s taxes are too high, and the region doesn’t know how to market itself, suffers from a lack of leadership, has wasteful government spending and doesn’t provide enough tax incentives to attract and keep businesses and create jobs.

And when they were done criticizing the region as a terrible place to do business, they piled on and did it again. And again.”

As we all know, Wisconsin has the seventh highest taxes in the nation and the Democrats continue to raise taxes and attempt to inhibit business further. Group’s like YPM - FUELMilwaukee try to cheerlead and think we just need to spend more money, they point to the “millions of dollars being invested in the Fifth Ward, Mitchell Street and Bronzeville” as major inroads against our failing business environment.

The real decision makers and captains of industry have spoken though, and surprise, surprise, it really is our high tax, anti-business attitude that is driving businesses away along with our miserable public education system that struggles as Democrats try to kill the widely successful, innovative voucher program. Here is an excerpt from the recent CEO forum in Milwaukee:

The Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce is working hard to convince Miller Brewing Co. and Molson Coors Brewing Co. executives to locate their combined headquarters in Colorado, rather than Milwaukee.

Denver’s effort received a huge a boost from a rather strange place Thursday: from Milwaukee’s business community.

Five of the Milwaukee area’s most prominent chief executive officers were featured in a panel discussion on “Global Wooing” Thursday by the Public Policy Forum. The five CEOs took turns ripping Milwaukee as a terrible place to do business.

The CEOs jointly described Milwaukee as a region with a broken public education system, runaway health care costs and an anti-capitalistic mindset. They said Milwaukee’s taxes are too high, and the region doesn’t know how to market itself, suffers from a lack of leadership, has wasteful government spending and doesn’t provide enough tax incentives to attract and keep businesses and create jobs.

And when they were done criticizing the region as a terrible place to do business, they piled on and did it again. And again.

The quotes from the CEOs themselves are priceless, it’s exactly what countless conservative blogs have said over and over again:

Paul Purcell, CEO of Robert W. Baird & Co. Inc., criticized Milwaukee Public Schools and called for more charter schools and choice schools. “We need to fix MPS,” he said.

Purcell also denounced Wisconsin’s “bureaucracy and tax structure.”

John Shiely, CEO of Briggs & Stratton Inc., was asked if he would consider building a new manufacturing plant here.
“We probably wouldn’t, to tell you the truth,” Shiely said.

…
When asked about the need for taxes to support quality-of-life initiatives, such as public parks, Sullivan said local governments were inefficient and duplicative.

“We are squandering millions of (dollars) of federal money,” Sullivan said.

If we want businesses to start looking at Wisconsin, no amount of cheerleading YPM/Milwaukee 7 groups will solve our problems. They have their role but, the real tax cuts, business deregulation and incentives will come when Scott Walker is re-elected, we have a Republican in the governors mansion and a conservative legislature.