Corporate Incentives: Website Ranks States Transparency

All but four states now post at least partial information online showing which companies are receiving economic development subsidies. But the quality and depth of that disclosure varies widely, both among and within states. Three-fourths of major state development programs still fail to disclose actual jobs created or workers trained, and only one in eleven discloses wages actually paid. The best disclosure practices are found in Illinois and Michigan, but even their scores would be near-failing as report card grades.

These are the key findings of Show Us the Subsidized Jobs, a report issued today by Good Jobs First, a non-profit, non-partisan research center based in Washington, DC.

“Aside from a handful of holdouts, state governments now accept the idea that the public has a right to online data about which companies are receiving taxpayer-funded job subsidies.” said Good Jobs First executive director Greg LeRoy. “But with unemployment still high, Americans need to know how many jobs and what kind of wages and benefits their taxpayer investments are generating.” Continue >>>
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