Market Watch – West Virginia taxpayers will pay $1.7 billion to attract a profitable steel company to a corner of the state where workers from Ohio and Kentucky may also be employed, thanks to what some observers call a hurried deal struck in a special session of the legislature in January. Read the full article.
The deal includes $1.35 billion in tax credits over several years, and $315 million in cash to match the company’s investments in infrastructure. The company in question is the steelmaker Nucor NUE, 1.23%, which in December issued a press release calling 2021 “the most profitable year in Nucor’s history,” and alerting Wall Street to expect “the highest quarterly earnings in Nucor history” for the fourth quarter. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate in Mason County, home to the proposed plant, is 2.7%, the lowest on record.
Nucor did not respond to a request for comment.
