Companies like Wal-Mart aren’t going to want you to read this book—all the more reason why you should. -- Carl Pope, Exective Director, Sierra Club

“A powerful compendium of corporate tax dodging in the U.S. Most disturbing is evidence that states and cities are usually paying companies to do whatever they would have done anyway. A persuasive study supported by lots of disturbing evidence.” — Business Week

For the past 20 years, corporations have been receiving huge tax breaks and subsidies in the name of "jobs, jobs, jobs." But, as Greg LeRoy demonstrates in this important new book, it’s become a costly scam.

Playing states and communities off against each other in a bidding war for jobs, corporations reduce their taxes to next-to-nothing and win subsidy packages that routinely exceed $100,000 per job. But the subsidies come with few strings attached. So companies feel free to provide fewer jobs, or none at all, or even outsource and lay people off. They are also free to pay poverty wages without health care or other benefits.

All too often, communities lose twice. They lose jobs—or gain jobs so low-paying they do nothing to help the community—and lose revenue due to the huge corporate tax breaks. That means fewer resources for maintaining schools, public services, and infrastructure. In the end, the local governments that were hoping for economic revitalization are actually worse off. They’re forced to raise taxes on struggling small businesses and working families, or reduce services, or both.

Greg LeRoy uses up-to-the-minute examples, naming names—including Wal-Mart, Raytheon, Fidelity, Bank of America, Dell, and Boeing—to reveal how the process works. He shows how carefully corporations orchestrate the bidding wars between states and communities. He exposes shadowy "site location consultants" who play both sides against the middle, and he dissects government and corporate mumbo-jumbo with plain talk. The book concludes by offering common-sense reforms that will give taxpayers powerful new tools to deter future abuses and redirect taxpayer investments in ways that will really pay off.

This book is part of our BK Currents series. BK Currents titles advance social and economic justice by exploring the critical intersections between business and society. Offering a unique combination of thoughtful analysis and progressive alternatives, BK Currents titles promote positive change at the national and global levels.

Visit The Great American Jobs Scam: Corporate Tax Dodging and the Myth of Job Creation Download Page

You can download free excerpts in PDF format.

Hardcover: 290 pages
Author: Greg LeRoy
Publisher: Berrett-Koehler Publishers (July 15, 2005)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1576753158
ISBN-13: 978-1576753156

Preview the Complete Book Online: The Great American Jobs Scam: Corporate Tax Dodging and the Myth of Job Creation

INTRODUCTION
Money for Nothing
Lurking within the records of most cities and states in America there lies a scandal. A tax scandal. A jobs scandal. A corporate and political scandal.

Look up the names of corporations that have received taxpayer subsidies in the name of jobs. Almost every big company has gotten them. In fact, the average state now has more than thirty economic development subsidies, many of which are locally granted by cities and counties. These subsidies include property tax abatements, corporate income tax credits, sales and excise tax exemptions, tax increment financing, low-interest loans and loan guarantees, free land and land write-downs, training grants, infrastructure aid—and just plain cash grants. ...

About the Author
Greg LeRoy is the author of No More Candy Store: States and Cities Making Job Subsidies Accountable and winner of the 1998 Public Interest Pioneer Award.

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