Remember...  Taking for the "Public good" has already been prohibited in Michigan in two important ways..

First, the Poletown decision of 1981 was overturned by the Michigan Supreme Court in 2004 with the case essentially defining the difference between public use and public good.

Secondly, Michigan voters in 2006 unanimously decided to amend the state constitution to prohibit the practice of "public good" eminent domain takings.

You might see where I am going with this by now.

What do you pay your taxes with?  Quite obviously we cannot offer chickens or any other real property to the treasury to satisfy our obligations, so money. as a substitute is used to convey that part of your property to meet those obligations.  The problem however, is when it is used not to provide services to all in an equal manner as a road, legal system, or schools might be, but is in fact given to another business to give it a "leg up" on the competition, be it abroad, or across the street, or worse... in your own industry.

The MEDC is an immoral extension of political favor funded with the taxpayer funds generated from business owners, property owners, or anyone else who pays taxes through the gamut of confiscatory measures used in Michigan.  The money is your property.  Taxation, though legitimate, is for specific USE of government.  It couldn't be more clear that the money (property ) you contribute towards government operations should not be "given" to those who know how to fill out grant paperwork, or game the system with a "public good" argument.  And some folks are particularly talented..  (just look at businessman Rick Snyder's involvement on BOTH sides of the cash window as the MEDC's first leader, and more recently a recipient.)

But it gets worse as we examine the details of such operations more closely.

Recently, there was a great example of how big money attracts big scams.  When the MEDC awarded Several Million dollars of taxpayers money to a convicted embezzler who had his world headquarters located in a 55x12 trailer in SE Michigan.  It was fraud, and a great deal of embarrassment for the operators of the MEDC money tree.  It seems an unlikely type of operation, but when our legislators started looking at the books more closely in a recent audit, they discovered:

The state's "flagship" economic development program may have doled out an estimated $150 million in tax credits erroneously in the last five years to companies that didn't meet the criteria due to a lack of oversight, according to State Rep. Tom McMillin,

It seems there is a little more than occasional waste..  $150 Million is a lot of paid beer breaks. And immorality aside, the system appears to be rife with little rule benders.  Indeed, while we must submit to our daily dose of eminent domain through taxes towards public use, the "public good" is hardly served by favor or unexpected mistake granting any one special interest a piece of our productivity through the use of force.