re: #153 Aceofwhat?

technically, you’re right. however, there is a substantive difference between a partial tax benefit and an outright payment subsidy.

for example, indirect subsidies are granted for all sorts of reasons (e.g. “please put your headquarters in my state, i’ll give you a tax break). however, because we generally dislike the energy industry, we tend to add up all of the subsidies and say “look, we subsidize these creeps”.

with indirect subsidies, it’s never that simple.

Louisiana is on a program to attract the film industry to film movies here. They do it by granting “tax credits” to the production companies - some sort of program where these can be “traded” or whatever, I’m not certain of the exact details of how it works.

At any given time, there are 3 or 4 or more movies being filmed in Louisiana. With crews. Needing food, lodging, peripheral services. People here in Baton Rouge have built and are adding onto a movie set (a new business - that hires people with families to feed).

Tax “credits”, tax “subsidies”, and just plain reduced rates, WORK to move money into the hands of people.