By taking money from the taxpayers and giving it to businesses in the form of “corporate incentives,” our state and local governments are playing a game of Reverse Robin Hood. They are robbing from the poor and giving to the rich. The Libertarian Party of North Carolina denounces all corporate welfare programs as fiscally irresponsible and calls for their immediate abolition.

Millions of dollars are taken every year from our taxpayers and stashed into various funds and programs at all levels of government. The purpose of these funds is supposedly to attract businesses to our area and help them expand, under the theory that this will create jobs and promote general prosperity.

This theory has two fundamental defects. First of all, the government has no place in deciding which jobs should be created and maintained. A free market is infinitely better equipped to respond to the economic needs of businesses and consumers. When the government starts funding already successful companies, it becomes harder to compete in the marketplace if you have a new company with an innovative idea or service.

More directly, we can not have general prosperity until we rid ourselves of our excessive tax burdens. The first cause of economic prosperity is when consumers have money to spend. But we have less and less spending money, as governments take more and more from our paychecks. And then they use that money taken from us as legal bribes to entice their corporate favorites to come to North Carolina.

In order to thrive, people don’t need Global TransPark. We don’t need the state Microelectronics Center. We don’t need to subsidize the film industry, and we don’t need a “public-private partnership.” The government has no place picking the winners and losers in the marketplace. That is the job of the consumers and sellers themselves.

Libertarians believe that people, making their own decisions in a free market, are a better judge of what businesses need to be funded. When people are allowed to keep the money they earn, they will decide what they want to spend it on. The companies that are rewarded with this spending money are the ones which respond best to the consumers’ needs. There is no overhead for expensive bureaucracies to oversee and coordinate these transactions. The free market is far more efficient at creating opportunities for businesses that want to serve the actual needs of the people.

It makes more sense for the consumers of air cargo services to fund their own Global TransPark. Those who have a vested interest in furthering the development of microelectronics can more efficiently pay for a state Microelectronics Center. This can be said in any instance where a government agency gives money and incentives to any business, unless of course when the government is paying for services that it itself consumes.

Libertarians want government to sever their ties with corporate special interests. Libertarians also demand that we cut all unnecessary government spending. We must free our citizens from the current oppressive level of taxation. We believe that this public policy of arbitrary economic meddling is not a healthy way of creating economic prosperity.

The Libertarian Party of North Carolina is committed to ending all forms of corporate welfare immediately.