Reply to Thread

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Message: <blockquote data-quote="HoLeChit" data-source="post: 4173033" data-attributes="member: 35036">I don’t live in OKC, but if I did, I would vote yes, and likely put a sign in my yard encouraging others to do the same. Yeah, it’s funding millionaires to play ball and stuff, and the thunders $50 million contribution is absolutely pathetic, but let’s just look at it from a numbers standpoint:The tax is a $0.01 sales tax on the dollar. If you spend $100,000 a year on retail stuff, that’s a measly $1,000. In the end, the deal is $900,000,000 to keep the thunder here for the next 26 years, until at least 2050.The current thunder stadium brings the OKC area $600 million dollars per year, and provides  over 3200 quality jobs per year to Oklahomans.  The new stadium will bring in even more than that. “If you look at pouring $900 million into the economy with regards to the spillover and effects, indirect and induced activity, we’re looking at over $1.3 billion of activity supporting over 10,000 jobs and $550 million in labor costs," said Eric Long, a research economist.That sounds like money well spent to me. Even if we’re only looking at $600 million per year for the next 26 years we’re talking 15.6 BILLION dollars for our city (and surrounding cities, and state) off of a 900 million dollar investment. The 1.3 billion/year would put us just short of 34 BILLION for that same time frame. This is money that goes into our economy, our tax revenue, our schools, our streets. This encourages better policing, fire protection, services for Oklahomans, and events.   If I could invest $900 and get back $33,800 in 26 years I wouldn’t even have to think about it.Even if other teams “paid their share” and all that, even if other states did things differently, we have to remember that we aren’t them. This sorta thing is something that can help ensure our kid’s kids (or more likely for some of ya’ll, great great grandkids) have a great place to live with lots of opportunity. This will also help bring concerts, conventions, and evangelists to our city that we can’t get with our current accommodations.For the record, I can’t tell you when I last went to a game, watched any NBA game, or went to a concert. I don’t care about any of that. I’m simply rooting for this because of the economic implications. Better economy means we don’t have to sit around making crap money in our home anymore.</blockquote>

Verification