Economic development policy is an area where free-market advocates like ourselves often share a great deal of common cause with left-wing progressives. We may start with different principles and have a different view of the appropriate roles of businesses and government in a healthy society, but we can all agree that the way big business and big government currently interact in these sorts of deals is a bad idea.
The Guardian took note of this “unusual alliance” in Nashville over the Amazon project there, and interviewed CEA President John Mozena for the story.
The ink has barely dried on a deal that the state of Tennessee and the city awarded Amazon and there are now only a few small hurdles remaining before Amazon starts moving in to a downtown office complex planned for Nashville Yards.
But an unusual alliance of free-market libertarians and union-backed activists is determined to hold the politicians and executives responsible for the deal to account. Their hope is that it will serve as a warning to others looking to hand public money to profitable companies in return for the promise of new jobs.
“This is one area where libertarians and socialists can agree on something: this is a bad idea,” said John Mozena, president of the Center for Economic Accountability, a free market advocacy group and a self described libertarian.