Author Archives: timbartik

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About timbartik

Tim Bartik is a senior economist at the Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, a non-profit and non-partisan research organization in Kalamazoo, Michigan. His research specializes in state and local economic development policies and local labor markets.

What should policymakers do about state and local business incentives?

Posted on December 2, 2012 by timbartik

Louise Story of the New York Times has a series, starting December 2nd (2012), on state and local business incentives. Full disclosure: I was interviewed by Ms. Story for the series, and I am quoted in the first article. From … Continue reading →

Posted in Business incentives, Incentive design issues, National vs. state vs. local | Comments Off on What should policymakers do about state and local business incentives?

Texas pre-K: what the numbers mean

Posted on November 29, 2012 by timbartik

An excellent recent paper by Rodney Andrews, Paul Jargowsky, and Kristin Kuhn examines the effects of Texas’s state pre-K program.  (Hat tip to Sara Mead, whose blog post alerted me to this study.) This paper by Andrews, Jargowsky and Kuhn … Continue reading →

Posted in Early childhood programs | Comments Off on Texas pre-K: what the numbers mean

Universal public services that are redistributive and productive are the key to reducing income inequality

Posted on November 28, 2012 by timbartik

Eduardo Porter, a reporter for the New York Times, has an excellent recent column that summarizes some of the evidence for how government can effectively have large effects in reducing income inequality. His column builds on the research of sociologist … Continue reading →

Posted in Distribution of benefits, Early childhood programs | Comments Off on Universal public services that are redistributive and productive are the key to reducing income inequality

Is our political system really interested in focusing on job creation for the long-term unemployed?

Posted on November 20, 2012 by timbartik

The more I read about the inside political debates during the Great Recession and its aftermath, the more I doubt whether the current U.S. political system puts a top priority on boosting employment among the long-term unemployed. For example, based … Continue reading →

Posted in Business incentives, Incentive design issues | Comments Off on Is our political system really interested in focusing on job creation for the long-term unemployed?

Why education is important, and early childhood education salaries

Posted on November 19, 2012 by timbartik

The statistics for this blog reveal that by far the top two “search terms” that lead to this blog are variations on the following: “Why education is important”; “early childhood education salary”. I suspect these search terms mostly come from … Continue reading →

Posted in Early childhood program design issues, Early childhood programs, Economic development | Comments Off on Why education is important, and early childhood education salaries

Boosting the recovery and long-run economic growth through job-creation incentives for the long-term unemployed, and early education investments

Posted on November 16, 2012 by timbartik

The Congressional Budget Office recently released a report exploring why this economic recovery from the recession trough has been unusually slow. As the report shows, as of the second quarter of 2012,  3 years after the Great Recession’s trough in … Continue reading →

Posted in Business incentives, Early childhood programs, Economic development | Comments Off on Boosting the recovery and long-run economic growth through job-creation incentives for the long-term unemployed, and early education investments

What works to reduce income inequality?

Posted on November 2, 2012 by timbartik

Lane Kenworthy has an excellent recent essay on what the U.S. can do to increase equality of opportunity. (Kenworthy is a well-known sociologist at the University of Arizona, who has written several insightful books on issues of poverty and income … Continue reading →

Posted in Distribution of benefits, Early childhood programs | 3 Comments

My TEDx talk on why early childhood programs are key to local economic development

Posted on October 29, 2012 by timbartik

My recent TEDx talk is now posted on YouTube.  In 15 minutes, this talk summarizes my argument for why early childhood programs can build stronger local economies.  It summarizes some of the key points from my book Investing in Kids. … Continue reading →

Posted in Early childhood programs, Economic development, Timing of benefits | Comments Off on My TEDx talk on why early childhood programs are key to local economic development

Why some business tax credits are so costly per job created

Posted on October 12, 2012 by timbartik

A just-posted working paper, by my colleague Kevin Hollenbeck and me, examined the state of Washington’s business tax credit for R&D spending.  Our conclusion is that this tax credit is quite costly per job created.  The cost per job-year created … Continue reading →

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The limits of later interventions for disadvantaged students, and the case for early childhood programs

Posted on October 1, 2012 by timbartik

A recent paper by Nuria Rodriguez-Planas presents discouraging information on the long-term results of a program to help at-risk high school students. (The full paper requires subscription access to the journal, but working paper versions of many of the results … Continue reading →

Posted in Early childhood programs | Comments Off on The limits of later interventions for disadvantaged students, and the case for early childhood programs