Lawmakers: Venture capital is about job creation, not about jobs

By Ryan Ekvall | Wisconsin Reporter

MADISON – Lawmakers just can’t tell how many jobs might come from the legislature’s newest taxpayer-subsidized jobs creation program. And if you have to ask about it, you just don’t understand venture capital, say the bipartisan players who have put together Wisconsin’s latest taxpayer-funded seed fund.

That’s the lesson for Citizen Action of Wisconsin. Rep. Fred Clark, D-Baraboo recently took to the Assembly floor to ridicule the group for asking about job creation estimates in the legislation.

The bipartisan venture capital bill, under which taxpayers will send $25 million to investors who promise to put up at least $50 million of their own capital to invest in risky start-up companies, does not require the chosen fund manager to even consider job creation when making investments.

“It’s a jobs bill that doesn’t even say investments should be picked with jobs creation potential as one factor,” Robert Kraig, executive director of Citizen Action, said in an interview with Wisconsin Reporter. “Unless you’re going to say job creation is a purpose of investment – one factor, not the only factor – why are we even interested in doing this with public money?

Nevertheless, supporters of the bill have had three things to say about it: jobs, jobs, jobs.

And a fourth word: bipartisanship.

“There may be few things legislators from both parties agree on these days, but one of them is the need to create more good-paying jobs here in Wisconsin,” wrote Clark and Rep. Mike Kuglitsch, R-New Berlin, in a Capital Times op-ed. “So when a proposal comes around that offers solid prospects of spurring private sector job creation … the public has a right to expect legislators to work together to get it done.”