By DAN JUNEAU

In the late 18th Century, a crafty Russian statesman named Grigori Potemkin wanted to impress the empress, Catherine the Great.

Off in the distance from the main road that the ruler was to travel, he erected opulent looking structures that were actually false fronts, much like the movie sets for old westerns in Hollywood. Potemkin wanted to give Catherine the Great the impression that his region was doing well economically without having to endure the expense of making real investments.

I do not know how well Potemkin did in Russia’s governmental circles, but he could certainly be a force in Louisiana’s state government today.

Potemkin would have been a great floor leader for the Foster administration’s Quality Jobs bill that passed in the recent Special Session. To the untrained (or somewhat bamboozled) eye, the bill appears to be a major economic development initiative.

But if you get close and try to peer through its windows, all you see are empty spaces.

Louisiana already had a Quality Jobs Act on the books before the recent Special Session began. Unfortunately, it was attracting little if any additional payrolls for the state, because its eligibility thresholds were too tightly drawn and it required companies to pay 75 percent of their employees’ health insurance premiums.

The cost of health insurance is extremely high, hard to control and very unpredictable. Employers have a great fear of roping themselves into a contract that requires such a high percentage of participation in an unstable market.

Every business and industry paying for employee health care premiums is experiencing skyrocketing increases.

The New York Times recently ran a story showing the trend for the foreseeable future being 10-20 percent annual increases for medium-to-large-size businesses and 25 percent or more for small businesses.

The current 75 percent Quality Jobs program premium payment requirement serves as a “Do Not Enter” sign to many businesses, denying them a potential asset to expand an existing operation or start a new one.

If businesses were not attracted to the existing Quality Jobs Act, they certainly will not find the “revamped” version more appealing.

The new law increases the required level of wages paid to employees and, more importantly, raises the health insurance premium requirement from 75 to 85 percent.

The cruel irony of the bill is that, while it makes more businesses eligible to participate in the program, the higher wage and insurance requirements will likely result in proportionately less participation.

Louisiana is experiencing a significant outmigration of both higher paying jobs and more highly skilled workers.

A properly structured Quality Jobs program could help offset those losses. Unfortunately, this bill is not likely to bring much relief.

One of the clearest indicators of how limited the impact of the new Quality Jobs program will be is the fiscal note (estimate of “cost” to the state) developed by the Legislative Fiscal Office.

After the mound of Senate amendments were added to water down the bill, the fiscal officer estimated its impact at approximately $2.8 million for all potential business and industrial users in the first year.

Interestingly, the fiscal note on the separate Quality Jobs bill for the Charlotte Hornets basketball team was $3.6 million.

This means the new program that is supposed to offer a viable inducement for thousands of Louisiana businesses will, according to the Fiscal Office, result in less tax credits going to all other businesses in Louisiana in its first year than those going to the Hornets.

The administration and its floor leaders will undoubtedly hail the revamped Quality Jobs bill as a “hallmark” piece of legislation for economic development.

When they do, just remember Grigori Potemkin standing in front of his pseudo village, waving warmly to Catherine the Great as her carriage rolled by.

DAN JUNEAU is the president of the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry.