Six crazy ideas for saving Detroit

Detroit could limit it to start-ups, or expansions of businesses.

Honestly, a successful company is not going to move its business to Detroit. It doesn't have the workforce necessary. It doesn't have the services. And, current employees will balk at moving.

But, start-ups might give it a go. Tech companies need space and only a few bodies at first. And, Michigan still has great universities. They just can't keep the graduates in town.

Young people are poor. They want a cheap place to live. Give it to them.

Besides, the rest of the plan -- low to no taxes for residents, and getting rid of regulations -- would be harder for other cities to match.

The other thing they need is to put the corrupt politicians in jail. Corruption hurts investment as much as anything.

 

Maybe if you cap the tax benefits to two or three years, enough to draw interest but not enough to draw people and companies looking for eternal tax handouts, or enough to allow them to use the Detroit plan as leverage to improve their lot elsewhere. But clearly nobody's going to invest in Detroit just for the principle of investing in Detroit.

 

So a semi-original, unlinked thought. Mazel tov.

The first thing I would address is the blight in the city. Take over properties that are not paying taxes and relocate those residents to government housing, even if more of it needs built.

The land that has been vacated or abandonded, raze the property either by a federal program or contract out a company to do this. This would cost tax dollars, and write into the spec that Davis-Bacon wages are required of workers so an outside firm cannot get away with paying $7.75 an hour to employees. These people working on destructing the city would be employed, and thus spending money and circulating money in the local economy and making it healthy again.

Once the land has been cleared, and there is a shit ton to clear, sell it for next to nothing to businesses with enticing tax breaks to start their companies in Detroit.

Cleaning it up would be the first step, and I don't think it will get done without the government stepping in.

 

They should just demolish it and turn it into Delta City.

 

Bulldozing up to a quarter of the city is an idea that has been around for at least 3 years:

http://www.businessinsider.com/the-mayor-of-detroits-radical-plan-to-bulldoze-one-quarter-of-the-city-2010-3

But, your plan offers no incentives for private investment until you've spent massive amounts of money "cleaning" up the city first. How much money will this cost, where does it come from, and how long does it take?

Why not offer the incentives now, and see what entrepreneurs can do now?

 

OCP needs to roll up with a dump truck full of cash and a few tractor-trailers loaded with ED-209s. Problem solved.

 

Force everyone out, build a giant wall, dump all violent criminals there, just like in "Escape from New York."

 

Top off with George Zimmerman, and maybe add a few journalists to capture what happens next.

Then stir.

 

You can give that a shot, but it will not get rid of all the crack houses and crumbling down buildings. And if left standing, I doubt your businesses will come, or if they do, it will not be enough to make a real impact on the city.

And tax dollars on projects like this are not put into a pile in the middle of the city and burned. Those dollars are used for paychecks, purchase orders and other purchases, which help other people when they indirectly spend this tax dollar for another purchase. What slows an economy down is when money is saved and sits in a bank account.

Sort of like what the New Deal accomplished decades ago.

 

The problem with this logic?

The federal government wouldn't pay the cost of the abolition of taxes.

Federal taxpayers would. Private citizens. All of us.

This is a staggeringly bad idea on so many levels.

If Detroit gets bankrolled by the entire U.S. tax base, what comes next?

Half a dozen other troubled big cities?

The entire state of California, maybe?

And I would just love to see the looks on the faces of red-state legislators when they explain to their right-thinking constituents that their paychecks will start shrinking to help pay for the entire city of Detroit.

Then there's the whole issue of corruption in Detroit.

Eliminate all taxes and regulations and the level of graft and theft will make some third-would countries look like pikers.

Yeah, that'll work.

 

Turn it into a "Blightland" theme park.