U.S. solar panel makers prefer overseas (this is a travesty)

[DainBramaged]

When SunPower, one of the country's largest makers of solar panels, went looking to build a factory a few years back, several countries vied for their business.

Ultimately, the company was attracted to a place that offered a competitive workforce and favorable taxes - and 5,000 high-skilled manufacturing jobs ended up in the Philippines.

"We would love to have the opportunity to invest in our own backyard," said Julie Blunden, a spokeswoman for the San Jose, Calif.-based company. But "the tax packages offered in the Philippines are difficult to compete with in the U.S. today."

It's not just taxes that entice companies to build abroad - lower wages and, in some cases, a better trained workforce help too. But taxes are a key part.

Now, as lawmakers scramble to pass a stimulus package designed to revive the economy and wean the nation from fossil fuels, more people are calling for a special tax break in the U.S. for manufacturers of renewable energy products.

Leading the charge are a handful of Senate Democrats keen to see these manufacturing tax credits make it into the stimulus bill.

The renewable energy industry already gets tax breaks - but they are targeted at producers of the power - the utilities and other companies that operate the wind farms in the Midwest or the solar arrays in the Arizona desert.

The new tax credits would be for manufacturers - the companies that build the solar panels, wind turbines, or equipment used in geothermal energy production.

http://money.cnn.com/2009/01/14/technology/renewable_manufacturing/index.htm

[BrklynLiberal]

1. Maybe there hsould be some import taxes on items that are made outside

the US, even if it is a US company.

[DainBramaged]

2. And people wonder why my hair catches on fire over these outsourcing pigs

[BrklynLiberal]

3. It is disgusting!!!

[NashVegas]

8. They Don't Even Have to Do That

They can give a tax break on dividends from corps that manufacture here.

[BrklynLiberal]

11. Good idea..

[rufus dog]

18. and on service companies that use off shore resources.

[anigbrowl]

22. There is. Why do you assume otherwise?

[madrchsod]

4. not one penny to these fuckers who go overseas for cheap labor

"better trained workforce"..fuck you julie

[Duer 157099]

13. "Better trained" = euphemism for

doesn't rock the boat, doesn't ask for raises or benefits or anything

[anigbrowl]

19. Right. No possible way anyone could possibly be better at something...

...because the rest of the world didn't sit still on developing solar while the Us ignored it for years. No, it's got to be a scam. USA workers are automatically #1 in everything.

[ima_sinnic]

35. how nice of you to defend the tax-dodging outsourcing pigs.

They pay no taxes, yet the Philippines is "better on taxes."

They are simply greedy, cheap-ass PIGS who exploit third-world workers with lax safety standards, unlivable wages, and unhealthy conditions while sucking up bloated executive perks and bonuses (that are not taxed). What makes them an "American" company, anyway? They contribute nothing to the U.S. economy. I will refuse to buy any of their cheap junk. It can be assumed that they do not care in the slightest about the quality of their product.

[anigbrowl]

39. Too bad there's no market for invective, you'd make a fortune.

[ima_sinnic]

40. yes, make sure to comment on the language rather than the ideas

so I can assume that my points can't be contradicted, then.

[anigbrowl]

42. What points? you didn't bother addressing mine

You just ranted on about capitalist pigs. I think the problem has more to do with the fact that some countries have invested more resources into education than the US in recent years.

[RB TexLa]

5. So North Americans are more deserving of the jobs than Filipinos, how?

[hankthecrank]

6. its not about who more deserving. Its where its sold and where its made.

Money paid to worker here buys things here. Which gives you a job. Or lets some one buy what you are selling.

[DainBramaged]

7. It's funny when I see someone respond to a post by someone on my ignore list

and you can figure out that they are defending the assholes who are outsourcing our jobs. I am glad that whomever they are, they have received the big red X because they will never "get" American made. Such clowns.

[ima_sinnic]

34. yes, apparently that poster thinks it is ok for "American" co's to enjoy the privileges

of being an "American" company without any of the responsibilities.

[SoCalDem]

17. No, but if the "american company" wants to manufacture there, then maybe they should BE a Filipino

company, and incorporate there..and let their government secure the overall environment in which they operate..

[Blue Diadem]

28. .

:thumbsup:

[redqueen]

32. Well said. (nt)

[TahitiNut]

36. I'm all in favor of people who want to hire Filipinos moving to the P.I. and doing so.

To them, I say "buh-bye!" I say the same for those who wish to hire Indians, Mexicans, Taiwanese, Koreans, Chinese, or Canadians. Move there and enjoy!

:shrug:

[Greyhound]

43. I'll second that. n/t

:kick:

[northernlights]

41. american companies get the benefits of being American companies

they need to share in the responsibilities as well. Or they can cease to be American companies.

[Selatius]

9. The US should change the tax codes to encourage solar and wind as a matter of NATIONAL SECURITY.

Staying addicted to Arab Oil will get America involved in wars that will bankrupt and eventually break it.

[DainBramaged]

10. I hope that the backlash from this story ruins this company

They want to sell their Foreign made crap here, they had better be prepared for the backlash. Why should they be given ANY break now? Of course these clowns will promote themselves as the 'green' alternative, but I hope American manufacturers lobby for tariffs on products like these that are outsourced by our own corporations.

[conscious evolution]

12. Suniva just opened a factory in Atlanta

I think state and local tax credits helped get them to locate here,iirc.
Giving tax credits on a federal level is a good idea in my book.

[Hannah Bell]

14. philippines = us colony

[MagickMuffin]

15. Obama campainged on making sweepinng changes to corporations who ship our jobs overseas

He will make companies pay dearly for outsourcing. And if US companies provide jobs here then those companies will receive tax credits.

Of course when people say "green jobs can't be outsourced" I have to do this :eyes: or one of these :crazy:

And this company has made my point.

What is it with companies NOT wanting to pay their fair share of taxes?.?.?

Why do they HATE America?.?.?

[anigbrowl]

20. This is such bullshit. They weren't 'our jobs'.

Those jobs didn't exist anywhere until that company decided they had the technology to create a better product. and they looked around to find where it could best and most affordably be made...and it wasn't here. Did they close down a US factory to open up in the Phillipines? No. They just decided to build their first factory there, because that was where it made economic sense. The Phillipines wanted the investment more than the US did, at the time.

Outsourcing has exactly nothing to do with it.

[DainBramaged]

23. You bet, they wanted to build the factory here but just couldn't save enough money

what a crock of pure shit you pour out over this thread. They wanted CHEAP LABOR. If the Japanese Germans and Koreans can build factories here (with incentive) why not these clowns? I hope you get to feel what outsourcing is like some day. Oh wait, collecting garbage can't be outsourced.

[anigbrowl]

33. You're contradicting yourself

you say "If the Japanese Germans and Koreans can build factories here (with incentive)", while ignoring the fact that the solar panel company wasn't able to get any incentives to build their plant, even though they tried. It is not all about cheap labor, but about whether they can limit their start-up costs (with things like tax incentives) long enough for the plant to become profitable.

I swear, a lot of people on the left seem to operate with the belief that a factory (or whatever) starts making profit for its owners the day after it opens. The reality is that very few businesses of any size turn a profit in their first year. The larger the investment, the longer it takes. Tax breaks from a local government are generally time-limited deals where the government sacrifices short-term revenue with the goal of collecting more in the long-term, effectively becoming co-investors in the plant.

[MagickMuffin]

25. You obviously don't understand that the company decided to build their plant offshore

Those 5000 jobs could have been American jobs, instead they were given to another country because the company didn't want to pay taxes. The article states that fact in there, if you cared enough to read it.

They outsourced those jobs to another country, when it could have built the plant here and provided American workers work.

How do you KNOW that the workers in the Philippines are building a better product than Americans would have made here right at home?.?.?

American workers weren't even given a chance.

[anigbrowl]

31. I understand that perfectly clearly

It's not about American workers not being given a chance, it's about (as you mention) the fact that they couldn't get a tax break here. Rather than 'we don't want to pay taxes, let's keep all the money hurr hurr', the reasoning behind such a move is that the plant won't be profitable over the long term if there isn't a tax break.

Do you realize how much it costs to build a factory like this? You don't just rent an empty building and put up for hire notice, you have to make huge investment in equipment, as in billions of dollars. It might well take 5 years or more for that plant to break even and start turning a profit, even with the tax break. Without it, they might go bust before they ever turn a profit, resulting in the factory closing down at a loss.

Other companies, eg from Germany and Japan DO build plants here. Usually they do after successfully negotiating a tax break. If you can't break even within a reasonable time, then building a billion-dollar factory may well be money down the drain. Generally tax breaks are decent trade off for the local government: they don't collect tax, typically for a period of 5 or 10 years, but it creates local jobs and there's a higher chance that the factory will be successful and profitable over the long term. And over the longer term, the factory will generate more tax revenue than it would have if it had operated for a few years and then the company had gone bust. You seem to think they never intend to pay any taxes at all.

It's a question of 'do we want 5 years of tax revenue now, or 20 years of tax revenue a decade from now?'. You'd be surprised at how many industrial scale businesses run at a loss for their first 5 years of operations. The investors put in money with the aim of gaining long-term profit, knowing that it may take quite a few years just to pay off the startup costs. Nobody in their right mind is going to build somewhere that they don't expect to eventually break even.

If you want to get annoyed, you should be asking why energy companies which harvest natural resources get a tax break, but the companies which build the harvesting tools (especially in areas of new technology, where the risks are much higher) don't. It's not that I don't think these businesses should be built in America, but that they won't get built here as long as it's not economically viable to do so.

[SoCalDem]

16. So... when they re-"import" those panels back into the US, just slap a tariff

equal to the taxes they "avoided".. Let them sell those panels in the Philippines.. they would have to charge lower prices , and would their "profits" be worth the hassle then?

ANY "Us Company" that "goes elsewhere" to avail themselves of cheap labor/ridiculously low taxes should be stripped of their USA connection and be treated like a foreign company..or be charges import fees..

[anigbrowl]

21. We already do that.

It's strange how the angriest people seem to have the least understanding of the details involved. Some people seem to think that these goods are only intended to be sold in the USA, or that those brought into the USA for sale are somehow exempt from customs duties.

[Name removed]

24. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Name removed]

27. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Greyhound]

26. Direct financing of start ups will stop this BS immediately.

We, as in the taxpaying citizens, could finance their competition directly with no interest loans to build and hire here.

This is far better for the company and churns our own economy. Production facilities are built domestically (jobs) and American workers are hired to produce the product (more jobs), and the taxes paid on profits build the infrastructure, or commons, to create a better environment for more businesses to open (even more jobs).

The overseas solar panel manufacturers, in this case, will face a competitive disadvantage that no tax incentive can overcome.

It creates true competition, which fosters innovation (the hallmark of American industry), which leads to better products.

Small business built and employs America, giant corporations eliminate jobs, bleed our nation of resources, and use our infrastructure without paying for the upkeep, let alone improving and expanding it.

Wouldn't you rather see the next trillion dollars go into building and employing America, rather than disappearing down the rat hole of "finance"? Do you really believe that China can compete with us on this level?

We do what we do well better than anybody else on the planet.

[anigbrowl]

37. This I would support

...although I don't automatically assume the superiority of American industry. The Japanese, Europeans and many other countries are really quite good at innovation and manufacturing. More patents get filed here because it's cheaper and faster to file a patent in the US than anywhere else: don't be misled into assuming that every patent filed here is home-grown.

I fully agree that giving much more support to small business is a good thing, and one reason I supported Obama early was that he had specific commitments on this. Of course, one needs to bear in mind that this means there'll sometimes be government subsidies offered for incongruous things of debatable utility, like sex toys or televisions for cats or suchlike.

"The overseas solar panel manufacturers, in this case, will face a competitive disadvantage that no tax incentive can overcome."

Um...why do you think that our tax incentives/subsidies are automatically going to beat their tax incentives/subsidies? I'm all for self-confidence, but let's not get carried away. Innovation and innovative people are everywhere, we do not have any kind of monopoly on that. I could point out a slew of product areas where other countries outdo the US (often because they were investing such industry or in the education required to get it off the ground).

What we do have here is a very large open market with relatively low barriers to entry - that is, there are no tariffs on interstate commerce, it's cheap to get a business license, the American labor force is very flexible, and so forth. And we have a flexible and innovative investment culture. The fact that much of our current economic pain can be traced directly to Wall Street doesn't mean that everything associated with finance is automatically bad, any more than pollution scandals mean that all industry is automatically bad.

[MadHound]

29. You can thank Reagan for that

Since it was he who eliminated the favorable tax packages for solar and wind manufacturers. Hopefully Obama corrects this problem quickly.

[4 t 4]

30. Our New Pres.

is going to impose tax penalties on companies that make their product overseas so they can either bring it home or go out of business Or they can all move there.

[anigbrowl]

38. Ding - we have a winner!