University of Wisconsin–Madison
Progressive Local Government
For the 21st Century

ProGov21 Policy Library

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Year
Tax Breaks and Inequality: Enriching Billionaires and Low-Road Employers in the Name of Economic Development
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2014
Level County
State(s) All States
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas Economic Justice, Community Development, Finance & Procurement
The intensification of economic inequality, one of the defining issues of our times, has many causes, ranging from the weakening of labor unions to the decimation of inheritance taxes. This report argues that another factor belongs on the list: subsidies given by state and local governments...
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The Other Environmental Regulators: How States Unevenly Enforce Pollution Laws
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2021
Level State
State(s) All States
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas Environment & Natural Resources
Upon the creation of the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act and the Toxic Substances Control Act, Congress granted the EPA primary responsibility for meeting anti-pollution goals, but allowed the EPA to delegate enforcement authority to state agencies. However, some state enforcement...
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Memphis Blues: How Corporate Property Tax Breaks and Stadium Subsidies are Sapping the City’s Fiscal Strength
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2014
Level City or Town
State(s) Tennessee
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas -
The City of Memphis has deliberately avoided its municipal pension obligations at the same time it has granted a series of costly property tax abatements, such as payments in lieu of taxes (PILOTs), to large corporations and sports franchises. For every year between 2009 and 2012,...
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Big Business Bias: Employment Discrimination and Sexual Harassment at Large Corporations
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2019
Level State, National
State(s) All States
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas Economic Justice, Civil Rights, Public Safety
An examination of federal and state court records shows that the vast majority of large corporations throughout the U.S. economy have made payments to plaintiffs in at least one employment discrimination or harassment lawsuit since the beginning of 2000. These include individual and...
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The New Math on School Finance: Adding Up the First-Ever Disclosure of Corporate Tax Abatements’ Cost to Public Education
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2018
Level City or Town, State, School District
State(s) All States
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas Economic Justice, Education
The Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) Statement 77 requires most state and local government bodies, including school districts, to annually disclose the costs of corporate tax abatements. As a result of the new rule, thousands of America’s public school districts are...
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Bipartisan Corporate Crime Fighting by the States: How Blue and Red State Attorneys General Cooperate in Addressing Big-Business Misconduct
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2019
Level State
State(s) All States
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas Economic Justice
Recognizing the difficulty of bringing actions against companies with abundant financial resources and lawyers, in the 1980s many state attorneys general (AGs) began to cooperate with one another. While initially this cooperation was limited to sharing information about their own...
Money Lost to the Cloud: How Data Centers Benefit from State and Local Government Subsidies
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2016
Level City or Town, State
State(s) All States
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas Data & Technology
Tech companies have been rapidly expanding their networks of facilities that store and retrieve digital information through the creation of new data centers. State and local governments routinely subsidize these projects, providing traditional subsidies, such as local property tax...
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The Corporate Culprits Receiving COVID Bailouts
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2020
Level State, National
State(s) All States
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas Economic Justice
More than one million businesses and non-profit organizations have been identified as recipients of grants and loans awarded through the Paycheck Protection Program and other provisions of the CARES Act. Good Jobs First has determined that more than 43,000 of those recipients have...
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Searching for Economic Development Equity: An Overview of Leading Economic Development Entities in Atlanta, Detroit, St. Louis, New Orleans, and Memphis
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2018
Level City or Town
State(s) Georgia, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, Tennessee
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas Economic Justice, Community Development, Housing, Transportation & Mobility
Memphis is experiencing unequal growth; while some neighborhoods are benefitting from new development, increased investments and an increase in high-paying jobs, others are experiencing decline or lagging in growth. This paper examines how economic development activities are structured,...
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Good Intentions vs. Effective Outcomes: An Analysis of Selected New Mexico Tax Incentives
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2017
Level State
State(s) New Mexico
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas Economic Justice
Tax incentives given in the name of economic development are the dominant form of spending for job creation in New Mexico; these types of tax incentives are also the least transparent and most poorly monitored. Thus, in response to New Mexico’s costly, ineffective, and insufficiently...
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Abating Our Future: How Students Pay for Corporate Tax Breaks
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2021
Level State, School District
State(s) Louisiana, Missouri, New York, South Carolina, Texas
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas Economic Justice, Education
Public school students in the U.S. suffered poorer schools—and local and state taxpayers paid higher taxes—in 2019 due to corporate tax breaks; economic development tax abatements given to corporations cost public school districts at least $2.37 billion in foregone revenue in FY 2019....
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A Good Deal for Mississippi? A Report on Taxpayer Assistance to Nissan in Canton, Mississippi
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2013
Level County, County
State(s) Mississippi
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas Children & Families, Civil Rights
Over the past decade Nissan has created thousands of manufacturing jobs in Mississippi. While the company has spent considerable amounts of its own money, it has also received large amounts of financial assistance from taxpayers at the local and state levels. This report documents...
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Show Us the Local Subsidies
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2013
Level City or Town, County
State(s) All States
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas Democracy & Governance
This report explores disclosure practices for certain types of subsidies per locality and provides a grade for those programs based on the quality of company-specific disclosures. The report finds that two-thirds of the economic development subsidy programs run by the nation's largest...
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The Revenue Impact of Corporate Tax Incentives on South Carolina Public Schools
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2020
Level County, State, School District
State(s) All States
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas Economic Justice, Education
Public school districts in South Carolina suffered a sharp increase in lost tax revenue in FY 2019 due to tax breaks granted to private corporations by county governments. The revenues of South Carolina’s school districts are reduced via state permitted programs that grant businesses...
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Grand Theft Paycheck: The Large Corporations Shortchanging their Workers’ Wages
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2018
Level State, National
State(s) All States
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas Economic Justice
Many of the largest companies operating in the United States have increased their profits by forcing employees to work off the clock or by depriving them of required overtime pay. An analysis of federal and state court records shows that these corporations have been embroiled in hundreds...
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Dirt Diggers Digest Guide to Strategic Corporate Research
Type Policy Brief or Report
Year 2024
Level City or Town, County, State
State(s) All States
Source Good Jobs First
Policy Areas Economic Justice, Finance & Procurement
Public access to corporate information functions as an important bulwark against the excesses of private power. This guide lists key sources of company information, provides tips for mapping governance structures, and demonstrates best practices for analyzing company legal records...
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Displaying 16 of 16 records.

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