This page is no longer being updated. As of June 15, 2017, newer tax incentive evaluation fact sheets are available here.
To ensure that economic development tax incentives are achieving their goals effectively, many states have approved laws requiring regular, rigorous, independent evaluations of these programs. For a list of states that have passed evaluation laws since the start of 2012, click here.
Alaska
H.B. 306, enacted July 7, 2014
What it does
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Requires evaluation of all major tax incentives
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Nonpartisan legislative staff reviews all tax credits, exemptions, and deductions on a six-year cycle.
The review schedule is organized so that every incentive that a state agency administers is evaluated in the same year, allowing lawmakers to compare results of similar programs.
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Ensures that reports draw policy-relevant conclusions
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The Department of Revenue documents the costs and goals of each tax expenditure to help the legislative staff assess how well the programs are working.
The evaluations determine whether incentives are achieving their goals and offer recommendations on whether they should be continued, modified, or ended.
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Excerpt from Alaska’s law: The review schedule
Every two years, the legislative finance division shall deliver to the chair of the finance committee in each house of the legislature a report analyzing the indirect expenditure report created under AS 43.05.095 for the appropriate agencies listed in this subsection. The first review shall occur in the calendar year set out after each agency's name, as follows, and subsequent reviews of each agency shall occur every six years:
- Department of Commerce, Community, and Economic Development, 2015;
- Department of Fish and Game, 2015;
- Department of Health and Social Services, 2015;
- Department of Labor and Workforce Development, 2015;
- Department of Revenue, 2015;
- Alaska Court System, 2017;
- Department of Administration, 2017;
- Department of Education and Early Development, 2017;
- Department of Environmental Conservation, 2017;
- Department of Natural Resources, 2017;
- Department of Transportation and Public Facilities, 2017;
- all remaining agencies, 2019.