Amazon I N C E P T I O N

Although this is a local issue, it demonstrates some universal issues in economic development. Amazon.com had started building a distribution center in Lexington County, South Carolina with the understanding that they would be exempt from collecting SC state sales tax (international readers, see sales tax primer at end), but a recent vote in the South Carolina House of Representatives quashed that implied promise, and now Amazon.com says it is pulling out of South Carolina...leaving behind a massive, half-built warehouse and an unfulfilled promise of 1200 jobs. I've given this a lot of thought and therefore am somewhat conflicted about the issue on a number Inception-like levels:

LEVEL 1

Since you are reading this on the Internet, you—like I—probably order stuff from online merchants on a regular basis. As such, we probably appreciate that nearly everything we order comes from another state, and therefore is free of sales tax. (Yes, I know I'm supposed to pay “use tax” on out-of-state purchases, but—really—who does that?) So, if Amazon.com came to South Carolina without this concession, everything I buy from Amazon (regardless of which distribution center it came from) would cost an additional 6%. Of course, I would not like that.

LEVEL 2

South Carolina, like every state (and nearly every government in the world) is suffering from budget shortfalls due in part to the recent economic upheaval. As a resident and tax payer, I would like to see more money joining my contribution to the states coffers so we can have “nice things” like other industrious states and countries have such as high-quality schools & universities, roads & other infrastructure, law enforcement, parks, etc. Therefore, at this level, I cringe that we were ready to forfeit this much needed revenue stream. (Granted, Amazon is never going collect or pay sales tax for any state.)

LEVEL 3

This distribution center would employ some 1,250 people in my area, undoubtedly there would also be multiplier effects as allied firms and other online retailers would consider this site, which—admittedly—is a great place for this type of business: minutes away from 3 interstate highways, regional postal, UPS, and FedEx hubs (who would probably also need to beef up their staff) within 5 miles, and plenty land for such expansion. Additionally, real estate values would go up in the area and new housing would probably be built. This would certainly benefit the economy of Columbia and of Lexington County. So, like many of my friends on Facebook and Twitter, I've got to be for that! However, I am not naive enough to think that 1,250 people will remain unemployed now; that's not the way a market economy works—there is no “lump of labor” that you just break a piece off. Lexington County already has one of the lowest unemployment rates in the state and is even lower than the national average.

LEVEL 4

Finally, there is the issue of fairness. Why should Amazon.com be exempt from collecting sales tax from South Carolina customers when all other retail businesses located in the state must do so? This is the argument of the business lobby that defeated this bill, and it is quite understandable. By not collecting SC sales tax, Amazon.com has an unfair competitive advantage.

While small business struggle to get established, nearly all states fight each other to land big businesses that promise to employ hundreds or thousands of its residents with generous concessions. They happily promise to forgo years of tax income, make commitments to upgrade infrastructure, create job training programs, and even loan or grant money and real estate to some firms. This is a legitimate economic development strategy that can create a successful technology cluster such as the one built around the BMW plant in Greenville, South Carolina. However, there is no guarantee of success, as seen by the now abandoned Mac Truck plant in Winnsboro, SC. So the question is, who should evaluate these opportunities? It seems to me that too often the big business draws up its own demands, and the local politicians immediately become cheerleaders regardless of how appropriate the project is for the long-term development of the region.

More importantly, I am interested in why underdeveloped states, regions, countries, or whatever need to prostitute themselves in front of industry in the first place. What disadvantages are otherwise turning away these industries, and what are the root causes of these negative aspects? I don't think that San Mateo and Santa Clara counties in California need to offer any special incentives to get technology firms to locate in Silicon Valley, nor does New York City have to do anything to keep the financial industry from leaving. Regardless of how sweet the incentives, the bulk of professionals in these industries would never move to some stiflingly boring Midwestern or southern state. I have written more about this previously in Promoting Innovation.

So, as I've said, I am conflicted about this; I wish states would collectively agree not to undercut each other, but I know this will never happen, so I guess I've got to pull for the home team and hope that some day in the future we will grow to the point where we don't need to introduce these market distortions.

Sales tax primer: In the United States, each state (and occasionally local governments as well) determines and collects a sales tax from 0% to 10% on all retail purchases (with some exceptions.) Unlike a value-added tax (VAT), this applies only to the final, end-user sale; manufactures don't pay this for raw material, and wholesalers don't collect it for sales to retailers. Also, this tax is only due from residents of the state in which the seller is located. While it is difficult to claim this exemption for small purchases you make when traveling to another state, mail order and e-commerce businesses simply don't charge it when shipping goods to an address outside of their state. (Oh, and to the consternation of foreign visitors, sales tax is almost never included in the posted price.)

Inception primer: The brilliant 2010 film Inception has spawned an Internet meme similar to “mind=blown” or “[insert strange twist], by M. Night Shyamalan” in which—to express how mind-blowing a concept is—you take almost any word that ends in “-ion”, put spaces between the letters, and make it bold. (e.g. Sales tax C O L L E C T I O N )

The film itself only makes sense when you realize [and this is not a spoiler] that the team has successive dreams within dreams, in which time exponentially slows down for each level, and if someone gets killed in a dream this person’s [un]consciousness goes to limbo, where time stretches out even more, such that DiCaprio’s character and wife spend a lifetime there one night many years ago. Also, since his wife has been dead for years, her appearance is merely a figment of his imagination, and thus her sabotage must be his self-flagellation.



UPDATE 5/21/2011: The South Carolina legislature relented and gave Amazon.com their sales tax exemption. Construction of their enormous warehouse (above) is moving along at a brisk pace. I'm happy that this major industry has located here, and I hope this area will become a distribution/logistics cluster. However I'm still uncomfortable that certain companies are allowed to ignore the obligation to collect sales tax from retail sales.

This American Life just had a brilliant show with the Planet Money team titled “How to Create a Job”; the main premise is that despite the big talk from politician and the economic development industry, they almost never create a job, they just shuffle them around from state to state. If you have a free hour, it's certainly worth the listen: (click here)

You can’t sing that, it’s my song!

I suppose the story is the same between young siblings and/or cousins in families across the world: a mother teaches her son or daughter a song, and the child takes ownership of the song to such an extent that you eventually hear something to the effect of: “You can’t sing that song, it’s my song!” when an older sibling (or cousin, or even uncle) provokes the little one by daring to sing his or her song.

It’s all very cute for small children, but we wouldn’t expect to see this kind of childish behavior among adults, and especially in the NGO world where everything is supposedly for the greater benefit of mankind. So it was with great interest that I read these recent articles about the explosion in commercial microfinance (positive and negative ) in BusinessWeek.

Microlending (a.k.a. micro-loans) have been the bailiwick of non-governmental development organizations (NGOs); I would goes so far as to say they have been the single, most effective use of these organizations’ funds. Their funding, which can come from a number of public and private sources, is given with the explicit or implicit stipulation that they will be used to help needy people of the underdeveloped world. Prior to Muhammad Yunus’s revolutionary idea of making tiny—by our standards—loans to poverty-stricken entrepreneurs in the developing world, development funds were generally either given to the governments of these developing countries, or used by the in-country aid agencies.

Of course, direct payments to a 3^rd world government or its associates does about as much good to the suffering people of in their country as wiring the money directly into their leaders’ personal bank accounts, because that is where most of it ends up anyway. Assuming this is an unfairly harsh characterization, at the very least and by virtue of the underdeveloped state of their economy, the policies put in place by these governments (of course it is always the previous regime’s fault) demonstrate that, collectively, the government is horribly incompetent—therefore, a direct payment is throwing good money after bad.

On the other extreme, you can send in your own people to administer the disbursement of these funds, but regardless of how idealistic they are, if they are intelligent, competent and successful, they will need to be properly compensated and will require a nice home with western amenities, an office with air conditioning, and a Land Rover to negotiate the poor roads. Besides eating away a good portion of the funding—ultimately intended for the suffering population you are trying to help—this also causes a certain amount of resentment from local staff and the population in general.

Regardless of which method you choose, you will only be able to help a small number of individuals or businesses in any particular country. This is the simple reality of the situation: the need is great, but your budget is limited—even if you have the backing of someone like USAID (the US government) or UNDP (the UN.) This, in turn, creates “islands” of development aid. While these “islands” usually have a geographic characteristic (concentrated around the capital and other major cities) it more accurately describes the network of people that are “in” the development community; in other words, those that get the help do so because they know people, know how to fill out a grant application, etc. Those that are outside of this “island” have little chance of getting any help (either monetary or technical), and again this is regardless of the idealistic and egalitarian intent the program may have been set up with—this is just how it work; some get seconds before equally deserving entities get anything.

Returning to the topic of microfinance, this is generally a wonderfully effective use of development funds. The purpose of each loan is to create or expand the business of a desperately under-served entrepreneur/small businessman—giving them something, even if only a subsistence job, where before was absolutely nothing. In effect, each loan is a direct, targeted (albeit very small) aid package to an individual, family, or small business that would otherwise have no access to capital due to a total lack of credit history, collateral, or any other traditional way to demonstrate creditworthiness. Incredibly, micro-loans—as they’ve been administered—have a surprisingly high repayment rate. This means that as loans are paid back (and with interest) this money can be lent out again and again—eventually benefiting many more people than any other development program could do with the same amount of money. Microlending has deservedly become popular throughout the development community; even the smallest NGOs and religious organizations are getting into the game. Since you are already on the Internet, you can even surf on over to kiva.org and make you own micro-loan!

Naturally, financial institutions have woken up to this lucrative market, and entered the mix. Now some in the NGO world, especially Mr. Yunus, are crying “foul!” However, in practice, the high ideals of people who say that we should not make money from the poor in this way are simply limiting the opportunities of a vast population who are simply not “connected” enough to be one of the few, lucky ones who gets a loan from an NGO. Regardless of their intent—in my mind at least—they come out looking like the child who says, “you can’t sing my song” or, worse the hood who says, “hey, that’s my turf!” The whole purpose of micro-finance is to provide capital to previously underserved populations; now that traditional players are doing so, Mr. Yunus and the rest of the NGO community should pat itself on the back for making a real, effective change in the world instead of worrying about their own turf.

Granted, part of their complaint is that these for-profit entities charge too much interest, but as more commercial players enter the market, the interest rate will naturally settle to a level commensurate with the risk of such loans. We know from basic economics that the riskier an investment, the higher interest (or other form return) that will be expected. This risk/reward curve gets a little discontinuous at the extreme where defaults are very common, but let’s remember that even the slimiest payday lender is providing credit to someone who has no other alternatives.

Likewise, I am concerned about the Mexican big-box retailers mentioned in this article that are marketing the western “have it now, pay later” lifestyle that may cause more harm than good to these desperately poor people; but who am I to say that only I and my fellow middle-income earners of the world should be allowed to have these modern conveniences? In this regard, concerns about payday/title loan sharks in the US and questionable lenders in the developing world both result in a very paternalistic view of the “great unwashed masses” of the world—which I am willing to concede is sometimes warranted, but doesn’t have a place in discussions of a free market.

Déjà vu

This issue reminds me of a very similar complaint last year from Nicholas Negroponte of the One Laptop Per Child project. (WSJ article) He was whining that Intel, Microsoft, HP, et al were chipping away at his non-profit’s business after he and his brilliant team from MIT developed the versatile and inexpensive (although never quite reaching the promised $100 price point) XO computer for underprivileged children across the world. Again, he should have simply declared victory—these huge incumbent companies are now making low-cost computers to fill a previously underserved market: the developing world. Instead he questioned their motivations—namely that they were just temporarily lowering their prices to get the developing world hooked on the WinTel platform (instead of his open-source platform.)

Disclaimer: This is in no way an indictment of any organization that I have been associated with, rather it is a general observation of international development efforts that I've seen during my stint in this field and from my continued interest in this area since then.