Report criticizes Missouri, Kansas business battle

Thursday, January 24, 2013

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — A new report cites the tax incentive battle between Kansas and Missouri as a prime example of how states are squandering taxpayer dollars in the name of job creation.

The report by the Washington, D.C.-based group Good Jobs First recommends that states stop providing subsidies for companies that move existing jobs to new locations across state lines.

It cites the battle between Kansas and Missouri over businesses in the Kansas City area as the most intense “jobs border war” in the nation. The two states have offered hundreds of millions of dollars of tax incentives for businesses to locate in the Kansas City area. But sometimes those businesses have moved just a few miles across the border.

The report says other battles are centered in Charlotte, N.C., and Memphis, Tenn.