A123 Systems layoffs highlight challenges for Michigan's budding battery industry

The chief executive of A123 Systems Inc. — one of Michigan’s most celebrated alternative energy companies and a major recipient of federal economic stimulus dollars and state incentives — conceded that a shakeout is coming for the U.S. battery industry.

How Michigan’s emerging battery industry will fare during that process — and whether manufacturers will add the thousands of jobs they promised to create in exchange for government cash and tax incentives — is unclear.

Less than two weeks after Massachusetts-based A123 laid off 125 workers at its Michigan battery plants, A123 CEO David Vieau agreed that some of the early entrants into the lithium-ion battery race eventually will lose.

http://www.annarbor.com/business-rev...massachusetts/

When will there be "enough" proof for the government aficianado's to realize that this crap doesn't work? Answer, NEVER. Too blinded by their ideology.

Job creation tax credits falling short in states

By DAVID A. LIEB
Associated Press

MOBERLY, Mo. (AP) -- For residents in the rural Midwest, the governor's announcement was golden: A global company with Chinese ownership planned to hire 612 people at a new factory making artificial sweetener.

But a little over a year later, the deal has turned sour. The half-built facility sits idle, as quiet as the cemetery across the street. The city plans to default on $39 million of bonds issued on behalf of Mamtek U.S. Inc. And many of the thousands of people who picked up applications for jobs there still are looking for work.

"They said they were going to bring in all these jobs, they had all this stuff lined up," said Patrick Thieman, a 40-year-old laid off call-center employee who had applied for an office job at Mamtek. "They didn't fulfill."

The failure highlights an uncomfortable reality for candidates in a 2012 campaign season focused on the economy. President Barack Obama and his Republican challengers, along with many contenders for state offices, can promote their plans for creating jobs, but carrying them out is lot easier said than done. Government efforts in a number of states are coming up short this year. And in one state that has been especially ambitious, Ohio, decades worth of data show the deals often fail to produce the jobs promised.

Some states have started to rethink their tax giveaways to businesses, concerned about the costs and about diverting more tax revenue from education and social services. But many others are determined to keep trying. Such efforts are under way even in places where conservatives are criticizing government for trying to "pick winners" in a free market economy.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories...MPLATE=DEFAULT

Another one for the government aficianado's in the crowd.