Archive Episode 54: Racing to the Bottom

After over a year of competition between hundreds of cities and municipalities, Amazon has finally announced the location, or two locations, for its HQ2. But in this archive episode, Professor Nathan Jensen explains how cities and states often lose more than they gain when politicians use tax incentives to bring businesses to town.

• Read Jensen’s SSN brief, Business Location Incentives are Ineffective – So Why Do They Persist in American States and Localities?
• Check out his book with Professor Edmund Malesky, Incentives to Pander: How Politicians Use Corporate Welfare for Political Gain, or the quick video they made to explain some of their main findings.
• Find his opinion pieces in The New York Times and The Conversation