Nevada makes the top five in the in Chief Executive’s annual survey of the best and worst states for business. Up from 6th place in 2009
From the report: "Bill Dormandy, CEO of San Francisco medical device maker ITC, summed it up: ‘California has a good living environment but is unfavorable to business and the state taxes are not survivable. Nevada and Virginia are encouraging business to move to their states with lower tax rates and less regulatory demands.’”
See the entire article here: Best and Worst States for Business 2010
Sears
If you had listened to the Republican caucus in the last session of the Legislature, you would have thought that Nevada was turning into one of the worst states for business in the country, because of Nevada’s hostile and confiscatory tax structure.
willk
Maybe those Republicans don’t want Nevada to even start down the road of California (ranked last).
disgruntled
Maybe all Republicans and Democrats are screwed up and need to be booted out on their collective a$$es this fall.
They won’t pass a term limits law, so the electorate ought to force it upon them.
It’s the only way the corporate grip on the body politic will be loosened….
Sully
When did DC became a state? I missed that memo.
Steve Herschbach
This does make a difference. It is one reason why I am choosing to relocate to Reno. As an entrepreneur I have to be cognizant of the business environment since I’ll have to set up shop. Nothing major – maybe a little warehouse and distribution. The number one reason I’d never end up in California is the fact it is last on this list.
There is a real gem in the article as regarding California:
“In addition, unfunded pension and health care liabilities for state workers top $500 billion and the annual pension contribution has climbed from $320 million to $7.3 billion in less than a decade. When state employees reach critical mass, they tend to become a permanent lobby for continual growth in government.”
Something people in Nevada would be wise to never forget.
SmartMoney
This is nice and all, but as more and more liberals poor into NV from CA things will eventually start to go down hill. There is a liberal in my office that moved here recently that thinks NV should have a tax income tax. See what I mean?
DownButNotOut
That poll is meaningless unless businesses actually relocate to Nevada. And we’re not seeing a lot of that. If I had an island in the pacific that was business friendly, charged no taxes and took the principals out to dinner every night I would be ranked number 1, right? But no one would move there.
What’s more telling in the survey is Ca is at the bottom, which means existing businesses there are getting shafted relative to their out-of -state competition and many might be considering relocation.
Now if I was in charge of Nevada’s pro business movement, I’d be targeting CA businesses hard like Texas has done.
billddrummer
To DBNO,
Isn’t that what the TRPA is doing with our room tax dollars?
Oh wait, I forgot–they are making sure that the casinos are promoted. Even though gaming win has declined for 22 consecutive months.
homepop
In the five years we have lived here, there must have been at least a half-dozen surveys and articles touting what a great place Nevada is to live and have a business. So far, I’ve seen “zero” effect on actual behavior or circumstances.
What raises standards of living and promotes successful businesses is an educated and productive population. Most people in Nevada do not value education. Most kids in Nevada do not see themselves going to college or even finishing high school, for that matter.
It is depressing, and I think that unless this changes it won’t matter what rank Nevada is given in polls. And, it won’t matter where California is ranked, either
Steve Herschbach
University of Nevada, Reno graduates largest class
The Associated Press
Sunday, May 16, 2010 | 12:10 p.m.
A record number of students graduated from the University of Nevada, Reno over the weekend.
UNR President Milton Glick called 2010’s graduating class the largest and most diverse in school history.
School officials say the class includes 1,475 graduates.
About 15,000 people gathered at the university Saturday for commencement ceremonies.
Students say the next task may be even harder: finding a job in the difficult economy.
homepop
Steve,
I work at UNR, directly with students.
Many, many of these kids do not stay in Nevada. They never intended to stay. They go to school here because it is relatively inexpensive (this will be changing in the future.)
They leave because there are few high quality jobs here.
And there are few high quality jobs here for the reasons I stated earlier.
Gina
So it’s like the tree that falls in the woods that nobody hears. When I was considering the move, with my business, a couple years ago, we found the new building prices to be California-priced. You know all those empty building condos south of the airport? Still empty right?
We looked at a bunch of those – not built-out (just shells basically) and overpriced. If we had found one that was reasonably priced we would have moved our small business to Reno then and hired 10 or so people. I regret not moving, even with the subsequent housing crash. My husband and I would be ahead financially and out of the California tax quagmire. Just wasn’t in the cards at the time.
Dirtbagger
Homepop has is right, without an well-educated and productive population, Nevada business climate rankings are meaningless. I have operated a business in both California and Nevada.
Business was actually easier to conduct in California due to proximity to markets/suppliers and a better labor force. Downsides as mentioned in other posts are high personal income taxes and housing costs. Nevada is mostly just the opposite.
To maintain a decent quality of life, Nevada does need to figure out a long term stable funding source for government and education. The gaming tax was a sufficent revenue source when the population of Nevada was under 1 million, but doesn’t cut it for a population of over 2.5 million.
The choices for funding the current budget are not great. 1) Slash education and services – how will this improve Nevada’s workforce? 2) More business taxes – the business community was dunned for about 800 million in the previous biennial session 3) Personal Income Tax – not likely – a political poison pill.
I would place both Nevada and California somewhere in the middle of the business rankings.
homepop
We visited some family in Roseville and stopped by the Thunder Valley Casino. I hadn’t seen it for years. It now has an Atlantis-sized hotel tower. The parking lot and casino were full. The customers were primarily what you see in our downtown casinos.
The difference? No having to drive over the mountain, especially in the snow.
I hear the Cache Creek Casino in Capay Valley is of similar size and is beginning to draw entertainment comparable to Reno.
Steve Wynn is threatening to relocate his operation to Macao because of taxes. The difference? No 12-hour plane trip to LV.
This state desperately needs to find a creative source of income, as Dirtbagger says. Nevada gaming is toast.
If Nevadans are intent on no personal income taxes, that’s fine, but the money for at least basic utilities and services has to come from somewhere.
billddrummer
We’ve discussed the propensity of UNR grads to leave town before.
My oldest daughter didn’t even go to UNR. She applied, and was accepted, but opted to attend NYU.
I believe that even if she had attended the local university, she would have left town before the ink was dry on her diploma.
Providing a local education is meaningless if the local economy cannot provide meaningful jobs. I think we all understand that people don’t pursue ‘lifelong careers’ any more–the best you can hope for is a string of progressively more lucrative jobs.
And you also have to be prepared to relocate, retrain and reconsider job choices as your work life evolves.
I don’t believe the university is responsive enough to its local community to reverse the exodus of its students.
A long answer to a short thought.
Sully
To homepop – those two casinos also make it easy to leave with a small fortune, providing you get there with a large fortune. Personally, I’ll never go back to either one. 🙂
homepop
bill – I agree 100%
Sully – I used my resistance-to-temptation skills I learned in Reno, after a while…but, we lost pretty much as we lose in Reno. Do you think losing is more common at the Indian casinos?
Sully
homepop, I think it is. I have never won anything in the Indian casinos and the food is so-so at best. I don’t gamble all that often, but the slots were pretty old and payoffs seemed like 98% (they keep the 98 you get 2). 🙂
tallguy
Billdrummer,
Please be specific as to how the university is not responsive enough to its local community to reverse the exodus of its students.. I am curious. It would seem like the university is graduating plenty of well qualified students, but the local community has not been able to take advantage of these graduates, so they go elsewhere..
Polly
If the jobs are here, they will stay. My neice just graduated last week from the Orvis School of Nursing. About 98% of the graduating class have jobs at graduation, and about 95% will be working here in Reno. A few have taken jobs in other cities in the country.
Now for English majors, it may be another story.
willk
“We visited some family in Roseville and stopped by the Thunder Valley Casino. I hadn’t seen it for years. It now has an Atlantis-sized hotel tower. The parking lot and casino were full. The customers were primarily what you see in our downtown casinos.”
We live near the Thunder Valley Casino but we never go there. The people who gamble there are nowhere near the class of people you would find at a casino like the El Dorado. The landfill is only a few miles away but even the smell of that is better than the smell of stale cigarette smoke that you can smell a 100′ from the entrance door (they don’t have very god ventilation). Slots are much much more loose in Reno.
EdBear
Damn, I love Reno, and I’ve loved it since I was eight or so. I loved the action on VA street, the people, the entertainment the activity.
How Reno has missed the boat. The last time my wife and I were in Reno (staying at the El Dorado) we stepped out to take a little walk. It scared the s##t out of my wife. Drunks, derelects, homeless — ugly experience.
I’m not a big gambler, but if I do, I want a place where I can wander around. There’s not many of them. Actually, there’s two that come to mind, Reno and downtown Las Vegas. Who wants to give the damn Indians anything, hell, they don’t even pay taxes to CA.
Now, let’s see, if I were running the show I’d:
Clean up VA street
Publicize how many good casinos are there
Capitalize on the healthy business climate
Publicize how reasonable housing is
Feature our (gernerally speaking) willing and available workforce
Capitalize on our non-union heritage
And, tell people, Northern NV is a great place to live.
If I didn’t have so many roots in the Bay Area, I’d be there in a heartbeat!
inclinejj
I have been to both Thunder Valley and Cache Creek. No need to really visit them again. If I want to catch a show or go gamble for a couple days I will go to Vegas.
I went to UNR 20 years ago and after the 2nd year decided to go back to the Bay Area to finish school. Why? Cause everyone who graduated from UNR back then got the “Why in the hell did you go to Reno for”
Sully
dirtbagger – “Business was actually easier to conduct in California due to proximity to markets/suppliers and a better labor force.”
I’m not disagreeing with you, but I think it depends on the business. Before I moved here, I spent 10 years coaxing one of my customers to move to NV. His business did not require a Silicon Valley presence and was spending far more than he should in rent, etc.
He finally moved his operation here 3 years ago and now is building his second facility.
I think NV is a great place to conduct business and I see a need for at least one type of business.
Manufacturing is one of those types that can do well here,whereas HI Tech is better left to the Silicon Valley crowd.
Also, research that doesn’t depend on leading edge technology. Silicon Valley is successful for a reason, it wasn’t just born and raised there nor was it created over night.
If just a few more manufacturing operations opened up here, then CNC Machine shops could follow (which is sorely missing in this area). I could go on for an hour on this subject, but I think you get the point.
Focusing on the state in order to start a business is a poor decision if the business doesn’t fit into the constrains of the state in the first place.
Perhaps a better way to say this is like real estate is location,location and location. Business should be profit,profit and profit!
A tax write off (or break) is only as good as it’s useful. A tax break doesn’t help a business already losing money.
Proper Planning Prevents Poor Performance.
Steve Herschbach
Hi homepop,
First you said “What raises standards of living and promotes successful businesses is an educated and productive population. Most people in Nevada do not value education. Most kids in Nevada do not see themselves going to college or even finishing high school, for that matter.”
When I pointed out UNR just had it’s largest graduating class ever you said “Many, many of these kids do not stay in Nevada. They never intended to stay. They go to school here because it is relatively inexpensive (this will be changing in the future.) They leave because there are few high quality jobs here. And there are few high quality jobs here for the reasons I stated earlier.”
OK, so business is promoted by an educated population, but the educated population is leaving for a lack of jobs? Sounds like a chicken or egg problem.
I disagree that people in Nevada do not value an education. I do agree that the kid’s are being forced to leave in search of a good job. My daughter was in that graduating class, and she desparately wants to remain in Reno. She will saty in the long run, but she may be forced to seek employment elsewhere for at least a time until things pick up. I do not think that will happen though, as she just loves living in Reno so much. She is into just about every outdoor sport there is and so the area is heaven to a young, athletic person like her. So she will figure out a way to stay put.
homepop
Steve,
Just remember when the Governor’s plan was to eliminate the deficit primarily by hitting the NV education system hard. The polls back then indicated that the majority of Nevadans agreed with that strategy.
This attitude by parents is assimilated by their children. You also see this in surveys by the WCSD and just plain looking at the high school and college drop-out rates. It is truly upsetting.
It may be a chicken and egg problem to some extent, but I think it has to start with the message our state government sends to the pubic and the message that parents give to their children. Those messages have to change.
OTOH, maybe Nevada should be content with being a blue collar state…mining, manufacturing, gaming, prostitution as Sully says. We can look to CA and other states for high-tech industry, state-of-the-art medical care, etc. We won’t need a lot of high school or college graduates then, and we can keep our taxes real low…
Steve Herschbach
HI homepop,
We pretty much agree. The big problem is of course that education accounts for the largest slice of the state budget so it is a big target for budget cuts.
Rory
Indian gaming is largely unregulated so payouts vary widely. In Nevada, there is a minimum payout which ALL OPERATORS must maintain and the Gaming Control Board enforces these standards absolutely. Payouts are significantly higher in Nevada than what you’ll find in a CA casino, or elsewhere for that matter. Gaming in CA is a bore. If you really want to have a authentic gaming experience, Vegas and Reno are still the benchmark in regards to American gaming destinations. Anyone that thinks otherwise is just shilling for the Indian lobby.
billddrummer
To tallguy,
Perhaps I wasn’t clear.
For the specialty schools (mining, journalism, nursing, medicine), it seems that career prospects are good for most everyone. And the demand for those disciplines is balanced by the community’s needs.
But I’ve heard that accounting, business, marketing, computer science, engineering and other ‘hard science’ graduates are finding few opportunities locally.
But it does go back to what another poster alluded to–what jobs are avaiable in this region?
Jobs requiring scientific backgrounds aren’t being created here in large numbers, unless you look at the medical profession. For physicists, engineers, and mathematicians, you’re better off moving to Texas or North Carolina.
I hope that helps.
DownButNotOut
I’m voting for EdBear for Reno City manager.I agree with all his suggestions wholeheartedly.
I would add that I’d aggressively define the types of businesses that work well here, such as manufacturing, terminal distribution centers,etc. and target those California Companies in those categories. Offer up incentives and inducements to get them to relocate. That would be the start of Reno’s revitalization IMO.
Sully
homepop, I didn’t mean forever…….
It takes time to build up a well diversified community and Reno area leaders seem to think they can encourage hi tech to relocate here just because.
Additionally, manufacturing isn’t necessarily no tech work. The company I mentioned above does some military related work. It’s not hi tech, but then who cares, if the environment is not affected and the invoice gets paid on time!
He has thirty employees on payroll (at least 3 with advanced degrees), plus some outside vendors that get a piece of the pie. Heck, its not General Motors, but add a few dozen more like him and pretty soon this region will start to look more diversified.
But to think you can start off running with hi tech and sit back and relax – well it won’t happen here. I know how they think and Truckee Meadows doesn’t have it, probably never will.
So why fight it? Take the lemon and make some lemonade. I’m sure, with the right movers and shakers, this area can function (eventually) without casinos or hi tech.
inclinejj
So my question has always been? If Nevada is so great for business why didn’t Silicon Valley have a mass exodus out of California and into Nevada?
Because Silicon Valley has Cal Berkeley, Stanford, Santa Clara University, USF, Saint Mary’s all w/i a 75 mile radius.
Sully
Although a little further south, Cal Poly should also be on that list.
homepop
Rory, thanks for the info about the Indian casinos…sounds like they should be avoided.
The more I think about NV being a blue collar state, the more it makes sense. Better to be an excellent blue collar economy (no shame in that, we all need what the blue collar folks make and do) than a disappointed and frustrated wanna-bee mecca for hi tech and Nobel Prize winners.
Irv
Incline, that area also has Cal State–San Jose nearby, which has a large student population and a strong business department. People tend to forget about those larger Cal State campuses, because they are dwarfed by the more well-known U.C. and private institutions. But most of any of the larger Cal States is the equal of a UNR in class offerings and student test scores. There is no way to compete for the high tech work with an area that highly populated by large universities. I agree with the comments that Reno would be better focused upon the blue collar occupations, and upon mid-level financial services providers.