House Bill 2482 from the 83rd regular session required the Comptroller’s Office to conduct a study to determine the reasons major manufacturers have chosen to invest in other states after considering development in Texas.
Spotlight on Executive summary:
Comptroller’s staff found relatively few manufacturing operations that located in another state after being offered economic incentives by a Texas community and/or the state. Losses of manufacturing investment generally appear to occur early in the process, before offers of economic incentives.
Our study found that no single factor seems to drive investment losses to other states. Instead, companies that invest elsewhere cite multiple reasons, including workforce availability and training programs, real estate availability and costs, proximity of final location to market or related industry and the nature of state and local government assistance.
The Comptroller’s office proposes several recommendations to improve the promotion of manufacturing development in Texas:
- Focus on training and workforce development.
- Streamline the incentive programs to offer companies a coordinated transparent process.
- Ensure Texas communities have flexibility and a variety of tools to use in promoting manufacturing development.
- Review and evaluate economic incentive programs.