Downtown St. Louis has some new jobs promised:
Hudson’s Bay Co., one of Canada’s biggest retailers, said today it is about to present its expanded information technology services operation in downtown St. Louis.
Apparently, the company is moving the jobs because of costs in doing business in Toronto. Also:
Officials have said that getting public incentives from St. Louis and the state of Missouri are key to the job additions.
St. Louis government officials will be on hand to celebrate and to pour the gravy. The center promises 130 jobs in exchange for the public monies. Note that these are promised jobs over the course of some years for monies probably starting now. Also, in what might be a stunning turn of events, over the course of the next few years, there might be a number of Canadian technology professionals relocating to the St. Louis area as their jobs move from Toronto.
If you’ve got to pay businesses to come to your city, you’re doing something very, very wrong. And the city of St. Louis continues to do it very, very wrong very, very eagerly. Because government officials don’t get to go to photo-friendly events when people just open businesses because it’s a good place to do business, with good infrastructure, good schools, and good public services such as police protection.
