A guide for assessing the local economic impact of business location decisions

The purpose of this research was to provide a guide for determining the impacts that industrial development projects have on a local community. This information is especially critical to local economic development professionals due to the lack of expertise and resources at the local level. Details concerning measuring the impacts as well as related information such as the use of incentives was included. The information was generated from numerous sources including direct experiences of the author.

The act of measuring economic impacts is extremely complex. Asking the right questions is as important or even more so than the answers. The tools provided in this research offer the local economic development professional a manner in which to think about what a firm really means to his or her community.