Instead of “maintaining and growing” Washington State’s aerospace workforce in 2015 in exchange for saving $305 million in state taxes, The Boeing Company cut its workforce by 961 more employees.
That brings the total jobs Boeing has cut from its Washington workforce to 5,624 since the legislature extended $8.7 billion in tax breaks to the company in November, 2013.
Boeing’s tax savings for 2015 were released Friday (April 29). This is the first year the state Department of Revenue has required Boeing and other aerospace firms to disclose the amount of money a company saves by taking advantage of the aerospace tax incentives.
Two efforts by SPEEA, IAM 751 and key legislators in recent years have brought new scrutiny in Olympia regarding corporate tax breaks. However, intense lobbying by Boeing has thwarted efforts to tie aerospace tax incentives to actually “maintaining and growing” Washington’s aerospace workforce as the legislature intended. Washington remains the only state to provide large tax breaks to Boeing and aerospace companies without a requirement to grow or even maintain employment in the state.
Boeing’s historic tax break from state even bigger than thought - The Seattle Times, May 3 |
