WELDING COMPANY SHUTTERING FLORENCE FACILITY …
|| By FITSNEWS || ESAB Welding and Cutting – a Swedish company whose Palmetto State expansion was praised less than four years ago by governor Nikki Haley – is shutting down its much ballyhooed Florence, S.C. facility.
Three hundred jobs will be lost as a result of the decision, as the company announced plans to move the positions to Mexico and Texas.
A year ago we reported on ESAB’s decision to cut 65 positions – jobs which were also relocated to Mexico and Texas. Now the facility is being completely shuttered – with only a handful of South Carolina jobs (no more than sixty, we’re told) remaining in the area.
“It’s incredibly prideful for South Carolina,” Haley said of ESAB’s big jobs announcement in August 2011.
Flanked by S.C. Senator Hugh Leatherman, former lieutenant governor Ken Ard , and a host of other elected officials, Haley said “what we are seeing in ESAB is a great sense of pride in the fact that they chose Florence.”
Company officials told the governor “our intent is to stay in Florence, to grow in Florence, to stay in South Carolina.”
Apparently not …
It’s not immediately clear how much tax money ESAB received to open its new Florence facility four year ago … but once again we’ve got another prime example of government picking a “loser” in the marketplace with your money.
32 comments
Will Haley hold a news conference to announce the job losses?
Does Obama hold a news conference every week when 300,000 more Americans join the unemployment line and file first time claims for unemployment benefits?
No, because the next week they have a new job. And that number by the way is ranging between 260K and 280K, not 300K. But then, I’m sure you knew that. BTW – interesting factoid – the total number of people claiming benefits in all programs for the week ending March 21 was 2,617,970, a decrease of 141,794 from the previous week. There were 3,163,363 persons claiming benefits in all programs in the comparable week in 2014. Seems like an improvement to me – what say you?
3.5 million people have been on unemployment SIX months or longer…that sayeth me…:)
Doing ok Rocky…medical issue,yes
Hope you’re feeling better. God speed.
http://www.dol.gov/opa/media/press/eta/eta20150626.pdf
To compare the nation with SC I’m using not seasonal adjusted insured unemployment.
Insured Unemployment (NSA)
————— US ———————– South Carolina
April 4 —— 2,374,817————— 15,829
Year ago — 2,853,279 ————- 22,606
Difference – -478,462 ————– -6,777
Per cent drop -16.8% ————– -30.0%
Percent of —– 1.5% —————- 0.7%
TOT. Work force Feb. receiving benefits
Who is doing better Haley or Obama?
Well Bible Thumper – the subset of SC versus US over last 12 months – SC has had a larger percentage drop (nearly double) so obviously SC outperformed the entire country as a whole. However, I might suggest that both percentage drops are pretty darned good.
Agreed. You won’t see Fits/Zerohedge saying it.
The linked chart represents my view of the recovery. Most has occurred in the last year and we have only recovered about 25% of the losses from the recession. I’m optimistic though.
http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300000
Just don’t expect to see participation rates ratchet up into the mid 60s, with 300,000 people a month retiring and or not needing to enter the workforce you won’t see that coming back anytime soon. Wages may seem flat but two items – 1) a lot of people coming back into the workforce are getting higher salaries to start with 2) inflation running well below 2005/2006 levels meaning some families can get along with one income.
“Just don’t expect to see participation rates ratchet up into the mid 60s”
This is particularly true for South Carolina. SC is a retirement destination and because of poorer health, more are on disability.
As the chart showed, there is still slack in the labor market which needs to tighten before upward wage pressure occurs.
Hopefully no new recession happens first. The economy still has to digest the final stages of Obamacare. Penalties rise next year.
fc what Bull Shit. Were do you get 300,000 jobs lost weekly. Typical undedicated South Carolina cracker comments. GIVE US SPECIFICS.
FITS jerks off on people losing jobs because he can blame Haley…
But Obama has destroyed the jobs economy…Haley has battled the Obama Administration to do some GREAT things jobs-wise..SC is a Great state, and Haley has marketed that very well.
Once we Dump Obama, and get a Republican in the WH to go along w/ a House and Senate…we will immediately REVERSE many of the Horrible polices and F*#k ups Obama has imposed…when the president hates us…he will do a lot of harm.
Obama has certainly delivered on his promise to punish us for being white, Christian moral and successful…
The GrandTango joined a website that lets him bid on free-lance work from all over the world. Now he is an unemployment statistic in 170 countries.
It’s funny how pieces of $#!t like you Suck the D!*k of Obama, and some of the greediest and most-hateful politicians in history – all the while demanding compassion – Yet you dance on the idea that a man cannot earn a living to feed his family…in this disastrous economy you’ve enabled…
There was severe violence in the union battles of the 20s and 30s…all because there were powerful people, who hated the welfare of others as vermin – like you – do…
While I don’t suffer from unemployment, due to constant vigilance, creativity and determination. I would F*#k you up to a Bloody F*#king pulp (figuratively of course) if some heartless son of a B!*ch- like you – tried to stand in the way of me being able to provide for the people I love, and am charged w/ protecting from the S#!t @$$holes like you ladle on us…
You may think it’s a joke, because your daddy dug a spoon is his Sliver @$$ and fed you…but some of us have had to struggle to be free…and nothing would please me more than to teach low-life slugs like you some of the difficulty families are having in the F*#king mess you- and those like you – have made….
Be a cretin and a pervert on an anonymous forum if you want…but don’t get in front of Real and WORKING people and spout your Bull-S#!t…if you do, you may wish you had not….Do I make myself CLEAR!!!!!
If you have something more productive to do you wouldn’t be here showing your @$$ now would you?
“Suck the D!*k”
There you go again.
“Be a cretin and a pervert on an anonymous forum if you want”
You are, hypocrite much?
You always know when GT cannot refute a comment with facts – he pulls the gay oral sex card.
and you love it…only two things you can discuss are gays and calling people racists…
Hi Flip, hope your doing well.
‘stand in the way of me being able to provide for the people I love, and am charged w/ protecting’
Thanks for sobering up, Has Bub Schumpert Road been paved yet because that washboard road played hell on my tires…
Glad I had finished my coffee. It would have been all over the monitor. Even though I like GT, that was a +100. LOL
Truthfully, I had intended to ease up on GT because he voted an “up” on one of my posts this week and didn’t include any snarky comment, and I appreciated that. However, I just found this one about an hour ago and GT was the only place it fit because of the grief some of you guys give him and I thought it would be appropriately funny for you.
You jerk off on people losing jobs because you can blame Obama. In fact you did just that right after calling FITS out.
OK, I’ll bite. So let’s take a gander at some statistics from the Buereau of Labor Statistics. SC today – unemployment is 6.6%, sames as mid-2006, was 10% in December 2008. Let’s drill down. Charleston – current rate is 5.8%, same as 2006, was 6.6% in Dec 2008. Columbia, today the rate is 6.0, same as 2006, down from 7.4% in Dec 2008. Spartanburg today is 6.7%, is BETTER than 2006, and down from 9.5% in Dec 2008. Now little Pee Dee Florence, today it’s 7.8%, up from 6.8% in 2006, and was 10% when the GOP left the White House. Using your logic, Obama administration has been wonderful for Spartanburg, Columbia and of course Charleston (even though he tried to explode a nuclear device in the harbor in December), and in general for the entire state. But yet, apparently he has. a real grudge for Florence. Or maybe, just maybe, it’s the SC and local Florence leadership that is at fault. According to all figures the economy of SC has rebounded and done extremely well under the Obama administration despite it’s obvious limitations regardind a very skilled labor force. And since a sizeable number of these jobs are going to Texas (which last time I checked is part of the United States) – it would appear the loser here is SC, and that RIck Perry and Texas came and took your jobs away. And you sir, as I recall, are a big fan of Rick Perry and Texas. So maybe in fact, it’s your friends who shafted Florence, just like your friends at Chase laid off 400 people last year. So once again, when your hypothesis that Obama is the Worst President Ever is tested against empirical data, you are wrong.
As expected – silence.
I heard that the company had their engineers work in HR for a week to encourage better teamwork. They immediately sent out an employment ad that read “Supermodels wanted, (must be able to solder.).”
NAFTA strikes again.
They moved everything to Mexico and South Border of Texas.
We should just hit them with a massive import tax to solve just this type of rip off.
Once again proving that the state of South Carolina spreads its legs more than Kim Kardashian when it comes to whoring for jobs!!!!
But doesn’t perform as well!
I supported and still do to a degree, government incentives to bring jobs. The difference is in the details. Yes, I would give you a tax break if you could GUARANTEE and it is written in contact the details of expected profit or at bare minimum break even point. I know other states are competing for these jobs. I do think we should compete, but if we need the REAL numbers. Are we winning or losing jobs based on incentives?
That is a hard number to come up with, but one well worth the time. We can also look at other states. In some cases it work, in others it does not – what is the driving factor(s) for those that it does work.
Yes, I prefer free markets, however, when it comes to family, friends, our own – I would be willing to do whatever is in the best interest. I would look at net gains.
Transparency? That is why we need it. Talk is cheap, bullshit walks. Yes, numbers can be tweaked, but at least we have a true benchmark. IF we have true transparency.
BLS can be a great barometer. I can also be BS if you take the L out.
It most likely was. That’s why like 60 jobs will remain. That was probably the benchmark number, first 60 jobs you get the cash, then we hope you bring more. If they go below the magic number they probably have to repay. So they’ll keep a token contingent.
Rocky you are killing me (laughing so hard). It takes a while to get used to your sense of humor, but I think I have it.
Yep, we get those 60 jobs, but how much did it cost? That is the number I want to see.