Another Lost Opportunity: Too Much Regulation and Taxation

I recently received a letter from a reader. Here are her thoughts, summarized.

My husband was negotiating with a foreign company to open a processing plant for our dehydrated fruits and vegetables and a distribution center in the United States for our products. He had been offered the job of managing the distribution center. The owners came here to review his idea. They found many advantages to locating in Michigan:

• Warehousing cost were favorable
• West Michigan growers and their supply of fruit and vegetables was advantageous
• Outbound shipping was favorable, even a day faster than larger cities in other states
• Available labor pool was favorable

With all these positives, they chose another state to open their Distribution Center and Processing Plant. The reasons:

• Michigan Single Business Tax
• Excessive state and local licensing fees
• Electricity (to operate the drying equipment) was too expensive

My husband and I cannot relocate, he would be too far away to operate our farm and work for the company. Our farm and my business are still here. If we could get what we owe on the farm, we would be out of Michigan. Instead, we have been blown away...just like Governor Granholm said we would.