I would like for the state and local government to disclose how much they actually paid for this plant. According to BEA records, the state and local tax burden on average for the state of Tennessee is about 8.5% of all personal income. Assuming that the subsidy was at least what was offered to Toyota, around $400 million, that would make the per job price $200,000. To get $200,000 back, it would, at a combined state and local tax rate of 8.5%, require each job to generate a paycheck worth $2,352,941.17. If that were converted to a 30 year stream of paychecks at the approximate rate that most governments pay to borrow on bonds and notes, say 4.5%, that would make the value of each of the 2000 jobs have to be $144,450.69 each year or $69.45 per hour.
This assumes that these 2000 workers don't come from Georgia and return home with most of their pay every night. None of these 2000 workers can be new workers with new children to put in school nor can they be people who have need of police, fire, codes enforcement, roads, sewers, water or any other public service since the governments, both state and local have already used that revenue to buy this job.
It is a good thing that our Governor Bredesen is using his legendary business experience and abilities to make sure that his friend Matt Kisber isn't paying too much for auto subsidies. It will probably take a while for this top secret subsidy information to leak out as well as exactly how growth can pay for itself when we are actually paying for growth.