the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
Dec 2, 2024
Earlier this year, General Motors announced it intended to move its employees out of Detroit’s Renaissance Center, with some moving to the redeveloped Hudson’s building.
In exchange for their “generosity,” the city of Detroit allowed GM to hold onto 200 million dollars per year in tax breaks the State of Michigan granted it in 2009, for supposedly providing jobs at the RenCen.
Dan Gilbert’s real estate company, Bedrock, which owns the new Hudson’s site, also received 100 million dollars for “keeping” jobs in Detroit.
Recently, General Motors and Dan Gilbert’s Bedrock real estate company formed a partnership and proposed to tear down two of the RenCen’s four towers and an indoor mall space. This would allow them to benefit from the rental of hotel, residential and office space in the remaining three towers. In exchange, GM and Bedrock want 250 million dollars from the state and another 100 million dollars from Detroit.
After GM and Bedrock made their proposal, some politicians expressed reluctance to go along with it.
GM’s response? They threatened to simply tear down the entire RenCen if they don’t get the funding they want.
What is this, other than simple extortion?
This is the same GM that received 126 million dollars from the state for its old headquarters building, and paid only 73 million dollars for the RenCen when it moved in, then received 221 million dollars more.
All these subsidies and tax breaks allowed General Motors to pay out 11 billion dollars in early 2023 in stock buybacks, then another 10 billion dollars in November of last year, and another 6 billion dollars this past June.
Billionaire Dan Gilbert received the land from the old Hudson’s department store building for free and the city paid for the building’s demolition. He received 618 million dollars in tax breaks from the state, over 500 million for the construction of the new county jail in Detroit, and 62 million dollars in prime real estate in downtown Detroit.
Billionaires like Gilbert and the big GM stockholders don’t take on projects like this out of the goodness of their hearts. They do it to make more money!
All of these handouts to the wealthy in tax breaks and subsidies are money that could be spent on schools, roads, and home repairs for the remaining residents of Detroit who managed to not lose their homes to mortgage and tax foreclosures in recent years.