Right-to-work law would signal: Kentucky is open for (lots of) business
The Indiana Chamber of Commerce reports that since the Hoosier State passed the Rust Belt's first right-to-work law, it's attracting the kind of economic growth that in Kentucky is limited to rhetoric on campaign trails:
Forty-five companies have communicated to the Indiana Economic Development Corporation (IEDC) that Indiana’s enactment of right-to-work will factor into their decision-making process of where to locate current projects.
Thirty-nine of these projects have progressed to the pipeline stage and account for more than 4,560 projected new jobs and $897 million in investment.
Of these 39 companies, 10 have already moved into the commitment phase, accounting for 700 projected new jobs and $166 million in investment.
Of these 10 companies, four have publicly announced that right-to-work was a factor in their decision-making process: Steel Dynamics, Inc. (Pittsboro), Android Industries (Fort Wayne), Busche (Albion) and SealCorpUSA (Evansville).
Creating prosperity in Kentucky will never happen as long as we rely on the state government's economic development cabinet to pick winners and losers in the marketplace by handing out taxpayer-funded bribes (sorry, "incentives") to try and convince companies to expand or relocate in the commonwealth.
Instead, as Lexington businessman and former Bluegrass Institute vice chairman Warren Rogers proposes in a recent Lexington Forum presentation, Kentucky needs a right-to-work law that gets government out of the way and opens the Bluegrass State's doors for business.