Face(book) the music

Now that social networking giant Facebook is building a new data center in Prineville, it’s time to set aside the pom-poms for a minute.

First, a company with a net worth of $14 billion won’t have to pay $2.8 million a year in taxes. That $2.8 million will have to be made up somewhere and guess who gets the bill: the good people of Prineville, where unemployment leads the state at 17.4 percent. This is how business is done in America: shift the tax burden from those with the most to those with the least.

Yes, the estimated 200 construction jobs are needed right now and the money that is made by those workers will likely be spent in Central Oregon. Great. But, after a year, those jobs are gone forever and replaced with roughly 35 employees who will likely earn less than the construction workers. Further, it is unlikely that Facebook will hire many of those 35 from Prineville or Central Oregon or even Oregon because of the lack of “qualified” applicants.

And, those workers are not likely to live in Prineville where the public schools cannot afford extracurricular activities. No, those workers will likely commute from Redmond and possibly Bend.

Here’s hoping that Facebook becomes a contributing partner to the social fabric of Prineville and Central Oregon. It would be nice if they don’t merely exploit their deal in Prineville, but rather give back as much as they take from the region.