Category Archives: Incentive design issues

Across-the-board business tax cuts vs. business incentives

Posted on February 23, 2011 by timbartik

In Investing in Kids, I calculate that high-quality business incentives can pay off for state economic development. For each dollar a state invests in high-quality business incentives, the present value of the earnings per capita of state residents increases by … Continue reading →

Posted in Business incentives, Incentive design issues | 1 Comment

Do all business incentives have the same national benefits?

Posted on February 17, 2011 by timbartik

I argued in a previous post that business tax incentives did not have large national benefits because such incentives did nothing directly to raise the economy’s productivity. But some business incentives do seek to directly raise business productivity. Can such … Continue reading →

Posted in Business incentives, Incentive design issues, National vs. state vs. local | 2 Comments

How should we respond to uncertainty?

Posted on January 6, 2011 by timbartik

Although there is good research support for the economic development benefits of early childhood programs, there is also some uncertainty. In particular, we don’t know whether large-scale implementation of some early childhood program will yield the same sizable long-term benefits … Continue reading →

Posted in Business incentives, Early childhood program design issues, Early childhood programs, Incentive design issues | Comments Off on How should we respond to uncertainty?

How we can improve the local productivity of business incentives

Posted on December 29, 2010 by timbartik

Although this blog (and my book, Investing in Kids) is mainly concerned with how early childhood programs can provide economic development benefits, I also consider the role of business incentives in economic development. Business incentives are tax breaks or services … Continue reading →

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Film incentives: why are they particularly problematic as economic development incentives?

Posted on December 28, 2010 by timbartik

In a recent blog post, Matt Yglesias casts a skeptical eye on incentives for film production in a particular state or local economy.  Many states offer huge incentives for films to be made in the state, on the grounds that … Continue reading →

Posted in Business incentives, Economic development, Incentive design issues, National vs. state vs. local | 1 Comment

Sports Stadiums vs. Other Business Incentives vs. Early Childhood Programs

Posted on December 20, 2010 by timbartik

Irene Sege, Communications Director for Strategies for Children, recently wrote a blog post at their blog Eye on Early Education on the economic development benefits of sports stadiums vs. early childhood programs. Sports stadiums are probably one of the least … Continue reading →

Posted in Business incentives, Early childhood programs, Economic development, Incentive design issues | 1 Comment