It's Time to End Hollywood Handouts

My Testimony This Morning on Texas House Bill 4568 Before the Texas House Culture, Recreation & Tourism Committee

The 79th Texas Legislature established the Texas Moving Image Industry Incentive Program (TMIIIP) in 2005. Since then, star-struck legislators have thrown well over $100 million of Texas taxpayer money at film makers in attempts to make Texas like Hollywood. As we’ll see, the effort has failed.

Back in 2015, Rep. Shaheen filed legislation to abolish the program, noting, “It’s time we end these Hollywood handouts to an industry that, at times, is hostile to America’s founding principles. We should only have to pay once for movies, and that’s at the box office.”

About the same time, the Texas Comptroller voiced reservations about the program, pointing out that most of the jobs created by the TMIIIP in the film/TV/commercial sectors are “either temporary, part-time (walk-on) roles, or leave the state upon project completion.” The funds, in other words, did not build the foundations for future economic growth. They instead represented a short-lived fix, highly concentrated in only select regions of the state. The Comptroller warned that money would have to be continuously pumped into the industry for Texans to convert their experience on set into a supportable career. We see the wisdom of the Comptroller in the folly of HB 4568 today.

The millions of dollars have failed to accomplish their goal, so now the Legislature is going to throw billions of dollars at the industry. At least $1.5 billion and as much as $2.5 billion of taxpayer money is going to go toward this program rather than be used to cut property taxes. This is not going to work any better now that it has over the last 20 years. The reason for this is simple: it is a giveaway, not an investment. Liberty shrinks as government grows. I urge the committee to reject this legislation and end all Texas film subsidies.