According to recently published news stories, Boeing CEO Phil Condit says that the state must do three things to improve the business climate here (a thinly veiled allusion to whether or not Boeing remains in Puget Sound): improve transportation, improve education, and gut the Growth Management Act.
There is a solution for Boeing and the Puget Sound region: the company should move to Texas. Indeed, the logic of corporate capitalism virtually dictates that decision. Texas has lots of cheap land with a large private airport connected to a modern highway system. It is centrally located. It is a right-to-work state. Its current political power is second to none.
Puget Sound’s transportation problems would be nearly solved, as Boeing employees pick up stakes and learn to appreciate a southern drawl, which is gradually eroding anyway. The workers will make less in Texas, they likely won’t have a union, but the cost of living is relatively cheap down there. (Boeing is almost certain to retain many, if not most, of its employees, who, notwithstanding Boeing’s criticism about the state’s education system, are highly skilled engineers and technicians. Texas doesn’t have this kind of workforce sitting and waiting.)
The worst mistake for Olympia would be to act on Condit’s criticisms. There is just no way out of the traffic mess, if Boeing remains. Period. Rather than scramble to keep Boeing in Puget Sound, the legislators should offer to pay the company to move its people and belongings to Texas. It would be far cheaper in the long run than building more roads that will never do the job.
Marysville
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