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"How do incentives work? In the Econo-Graphics Jr. series, young readers will examine economy-related issues from many angles, all portrayed through visual elements. Income, budgeting, investing, supply and demand, global markets, inflation, and more are covered. Each book highlights pandemic-era impacts as well. Created with developing readers in mind, charts, graphs, maps, and infographics provide key content in an engaging and accessible way. Books include an activity, glossary, index, suggested reading and websites, and a bibliography"--

This paper reviews the research literature relevant to economic development incentives provided by state and local governments, and recommends reforms in these incentives. I argue that the main problem with current incentive policies is that state and local governments often provide incentives that are not in the best interest of that state or local area, for example that are excessively costly per job created, or that provide jobs that do not improve the job opportunities of local residents. I suggest that reforms should be "bottom-up" rather than "top-down." Regulation of incentives by the federal government, or by international trade treaties, may prevent both desirable and undesirable incentives. "Bottom-up" reforms would include more information on incentive offers, a budget constraint on the volume of incentives, stronger standards for job quality, accessibility, and performance in incentives, and better benefit-cost analyses of incentives. ; A revised version of this paper titled "Solving the Problems of Economic Development Incentives" appears in Growth and Change, 36(2), Spring 2005.

In this paper, I examine how the incentives of regions to unite and to separate are related to the incentives to provide public goods. Separation allows for greater influence over the nature of political decision making while unification allows regions to exploit economies of scale in the provision of public goods. From a social welfare perspective, there are excessive incentives for separation and for the provision of public goods. When incentives for public good provision are not taken into account, however, these incentives can be misinterpreted as incentives for separation. Adapted from the source document.