By Alan Ferguson
There was a story done last week in the Washington Post that is relevant to our own megasite project. It’s from March 9, and it’s about a new manufacturing trend in the United States. The reporter studied the Nissan factory in New Smyrna, Tennessee. (If you want to read it here is the link to the whole thing: This is what a job in the U.S.’s new manufacturing industry looks like). I thought it important enough to summarize for everyone.
We all know the extent to which the megasite proponents here have stressed the necessity for bringing high-paying jobs into our area. Our own research has revealed that the promises made by economic developers and the consultants who drive these efforts often outpace the results. Now, this Post reporter has just written up the results of her study of this one Nissan plant. Here are the highlights:
1. Over one-half of the plant’s 7,000 workers do not work for Nissan. They are employed by something called “Yates Staffing”, a temporary labor agency which provides workers to Nissan as they are needed and pays them itself. The “temporary” workers perform the same work as those who work directly for Nissan and are paid by Nissan.
2. Beginning in 2008, Nissan fired about one-third of its work force. Rather than bringing them back, they have chosen to hire temps. Yates pays its temps between $10 and $18 per hour. That’s about one-half what Nissan pays “its” workers, and it provides fewer benefits than the Nissan employees working alongside the Yates employees. We can only guess which of these parallel employment models will win out at the plant.
3. Nearly all of Tennessee’s job growth since the Great Recession has been in temporary workers.
4. Median wages in Tennessee have been flat despite the state adding all of these new jobs (which are being sold to our area as “high paying” jobs), and despite the presence of this plant and several other high touted and heavily recruited new plants.
5. So far, the taxpayers of Tennessee have given Nissan “more than half a billion dollars since 2000 in subsidies and tax incentives”. Of course, the taxpayers also previously built all of the new roads to the plant.
We cannot believe all that we read, but the evidence certainly is mounting that our area is being sold a bill of goods regarding megasites and the kind of businesses they attract and wealth they bring. For us to endure the kind of disruption and higher taxes that this kind of development will bring with it, it would seem to me that the project must guaranty a very positive step forward for us all. The evidence is every day more convincing that that just cannot be done.
Alan Ferguson
President, Northeast Randolph Property Owners
Editor's note: Let us not forget that Councilman Zack Matheny and Greensboro's economic development "gurus" are pushing megasites over homegrown local manufacturing as the "key" to Greensboro's future instead of looking at ways Greensboro could actually profit from incentives to local companies.
Also, people move to the country expecting to be far from the hustle and bustle of the city. They expect to drive to the city to work and get what they need. People move to cities in search of conveniences like jobs, expecting the hustle and bustle. Putting megasites and jobs out in the country defeats the purpose of having cities and encourages more people to move away from the city thus harming the city overall. Megasites destroy farm land making us dependent on imported and unsafe food. Only 2% of imported foods are safety tested. Dumb Greensboro, just plain dumb.
