"What benefits do you want?"
That question... had actually come up rather suddenly. Asking for benefits had been purely instinctive; it had nothing to do with any plan or strategy. Instead, Mr. Truman's counterquestion had caught Lin Qi off guard, and he hadn't yet considered what benefit would be best to ask for.
Money?
Setting aside whether Congress would agree to allocate some money to Lin Qi as a form of compensation, the amount itself was a problem.
If they gave him too little, it would make the whole thing seem childish. He might as well ask for nothing.
If they gave him too much, the president might not approve it. He might even decide that Lin Qi was narrow-minded and greedy.
So money was out of the question.
Land? It seemed like a good idea, but in reality, it was the least valuable option.
Land in the Federation was privately owned. In other words, the Federal Government could only give private citizens land that belonged to no one. Land in the city center, for example, was simply not available.
All they could give Lin Qi was worthless land outside the cities.
That land was not only worthless, it also came with the burden of creating various jobs and paying property taxes. It was impossible to say whether that would be a profit or a loss.
Valuable land was real land. Worthless land was nothing but trash!
Tax exemption?
That might be a very practical benefit, but the Federal Government could never approve too much of it.
If the tax exemption were too large, people would object. If someone exposed it to the media, public opinion would fan the flames, and a story about corruption and collusion would soon emerge.
Many people would suffer as a result, including Lin Qi