Quantifying the Benefits of Business Tax Breaks

We're about to find out if business tax breaks deliver on the promises:

The state each year doles out tens of millions of dollars in tax breaks to businesses to encourage them to expand and create jobs.

Who receives the breaks? How much do they receive? And do the businesses follow through when it comes to promised job creation and economic development?

Taxpayers will soon get to see for themselves.

Legislation approved by the General Assembly and signed into law by Governor Carcieri last month will, for the first time, require businesses to fess up — publicly.

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The information will be posted on the state Division of Taxation’s Web site, and incorporated into the state’s annual budget-making process, said Gary S. Sasse, director of the state Department of Revenue.

State officials will use the information to determine, for example, how many jobs — if any — each such business created in connection with the incentive.

Thus, taxpayers will get to see, by name, which businesses receive which incentives, how much they receive, and the degree to which each business has met its goal for job retention and job creation and economic development, Sasse said.