How badly does a state want to get a company? And how much are they willing to have taxpayers pay in WELFARE IN ADVANCE to do it? Just ask Governor Perry. And then ask why Countrywide Financing, which is part of the subprime meltdown fiasco, is laying people off instead of adding jobs.. but won't tell Texas, from whom they have taken 20 MILLION DOLLARS how many exactly, in Texas, are being laid off.
When Countrywide Financial Corp. announced that it was bringing 7,500 jobs to Texas in a deal with Gov. Rick Perry's job-creation fund, the governor proclaimed the company a "crowning jewel" deserving $20 million in taxpayer money....
Countrywide is at the epicenter of the mortgage industry meltdown, laying off as many as 12,000 workers nationally. It won't reveal how many jobs will be slashed in Texas, home to about one-fifth of its employees. But Countrywide announced in September the closing of its 100-person Midland office.
It isn't the first company to lay off workers after securing millions of dollars in grants from the Texas Enterprise Fund, according to an Associated Press review of the program.
At least five other major companies - Vought Aircraft Industries, Texas Instruments, Washington Mutual, Raytheon and Lockheed Martin - laid off Texas workers after entering agreements with the job-creation fund, records show.
None has been required to pay money back to the state. Most companies have a multiyear deal allowing them to add jobs gradually as they aim for a target number of jobs by a specified date, regardless of whether they lay off employees along the way.
And re: the subprime fallout
California-based Countrywide, the nation's largest mortgage lender, has come under scrutiny for lending money to borrowers with poor credit. Some of those clients have defaulted on their loans.
"How many foreclosures did we subsidize with Countrywide?" Baylor said.
Even more important, I had thought that Perry's Texas Enterprise Fund was somehow being paid into by companies who were contributing to business interests. Silly me. YOU AND I are paying for it, and we have NO sayso in where all that welfare gets dished out.
