This study analyzes the transfer of tax dollars from "retail poor" to "retail rich" counties via local option sales taxes in Iowa. These taxes may potentially transfer more than one billion dollars from rural to urban counties over the next ten years. The implications for economic development...

Iowa State University Extension Service has been computing retail surplus and leakage for Iowa counties for about 20 years. The purpose of these computations is to inform merchants and county leaders of the status of retail trade in their counties, compared to other counties, and to indicate any...

The philosophy of fiscal federalism presumes that local communities will under- or over-provide public amenities in the presence of externalities.  We test this hypothesis using data from Vision Iowa, a state program which provided partial funding to communities to build tourist attractions. ...

One possible strategy for both succession and new business development is employee ownership.  New business formation as an employee-owned firm or cooperative may have some advantages over formation as a sole proprietorship or partnership: pooling financial resources, spreading risk and...

  This paper examines the roles of specialized versus general skills in explaining variation in the returns to an agriculture degree across majors inside and outside the agricultural industry. The focus on returns by sector of employment is motivated by the finding that most agricultural majors...