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$700B Bailout Gives A Tax Break To NASCAR Tracks

October 4, 2008 · Filed Under Bailout Bill, Commentary, NASCAR

By: Keith Bloemendaal

government, NASCAR, bailout, $700B, USA Yes, you heard right. The Government decided to include NASCAR in it's plan to "rescue" the country from the economic crisis we are facing.

Under the terms of the financial “rescue plan,” motor sports facilities will be allowed to depreciate their capital investments over a 7 year period rather than the previously stated 15 year time frame. That means less of the earnings from each of those seven years will go towards taxes, helping the track owners achieve a higher annual profit in the short term. The new provision will provide incentives for track owners to invest in their facilities on improvements such as repaving tracks, new concession stands, parking lots and more.

Normally, I would be screaming "FOUL" at this point, but I gave it more thought and you should too.

This not only helps NASCAR track owners make upgrades to the facilities that have earned them millions, but jobs get created through it. When the tracks contract the repaving of the racing surface so Kyle Busch can get put in the wall by someone paying him back for an earlier race incident, this creates jobs for the contractors involved in the paving. Or when the owners of these facilities repave the parking lots, so drunken fans can pass out on a smooth piece of concrete, this creates jobs and revenues for construction workers (who are suffering through this housing crisis tremendously, I know because I am in construction as well).

In the past, owners used this tax break to install the safer barrier walls on many tracks, which could have saved lives had it been on the tracks sooner (lives like Dale Earnhardt Sr).

In closing of this short post, before you cry foul because the government gave a tax break to track owners, essentially, this will boost economic growth by providing revenues to many companies and the folks who work for them. This creates revenues for all the businesses that these workers do business with, from grocery stores, to restaurants, to landlords, to mortgage companies, gas stations, retail shops (Christmas is soon!) and many more. I though about what the average construction worker makes, maybe $500 a week. Do you think he gets to keep any of it under his pillow? No, it all gets spent somewhere. So, every job created, in a sense, helps the rest of us who luckily still are working.