Productivity and Accessibility: Bridging Project-Specific and Macroeconomic Analyses of Transportation Investments

When it comes to transportation analysis, there are two primary perspectives typically used in the corresponding studies. The first relies on overly narrow measures of economic benefits and the second focuses on economic productivity, defines benefits more broadly, and is limited by geographic and functional aggregation constraints. The objective of this study was to connect both perspectives and describe how project-specific analysis methods can shed light on the overall macroeconomic effects of transportation infrastructure spending. Current research on productivity is at a sufficiently aggregate level so as to miss potentially important location-specific aspects and congestion relief elements of needs for highway system development, which may affect future benefits from highway improvements.

Economic Development Research Group, REMI – Productivity and Accessibility: Bridging Project-Specific and Macroeconomic Analyses of Transportation Investments [full PDF]

The Massachusetts Dynamic Analysis Model

The Dynamic Analysis Model is the combination of microsimulation and macroeconomic models used to address the critical needs of policy analysts assessing the impact of tax proposals on the economy. The REMI model was fused with a simulation model from the Tax Economics Department of Price Waterhouse to analyze economic impacts and dynamic feedbacks for Massachusetts’ most complex prospective policies. This report includes an example simulation of a revenue-neutral increase in the investment tax credit for corporations financed by equal proportionate increases in tax rates for all state taxes.

Massachusetts Department of Revenue – The Massachusetts Dynamic Analysis Model [full PDF]

Conjoining an Input-Output Model and a Policy Analysis Model: A Case Study of the Regional Economic Effects of Expanding a Port Facility

The concept of melding together two separate models to arrange the most complete economic picture possible is analyzed in this 1980 report. The MIO and MEPA models were brought together for a project evaluating the economic effects of container-port expansion at the Massachusetts Port Authority. Researchers were able to perform a policy simulation that used both detailed inter-industry relationships and well specified econometric structural equations by conjoining the MEPA and MIO models. The results showed potentially substantial gains in wages, personal income, and state government revenues, but only modest increases in employment gains per ten million dollars of investment in port facility construction.

University of Massachusetts Amherst – Conjoining an Input-Output Model and a Policy Analysis Model: Case Study of the Regional Economic Effects of Expanding a Port Facility [full PDF]

Economic and Fiscal Impact Analysis of Maryland Tax Policy Options

Ernst & Young analyzed the economic and fiscal impacts of possible changes to Maryland’s state tax policy structure that were under public discussion using the economic and policy REMI model for Maryland to estimate dynamic feedback effects. The modeling of the dynamic impacts provided new information about the economic impacts of state tax changes that were not provided in the Fiscal and Policy Notes prepared during the legislative process. The results of the analysis determined that Maryland businesses would pay a significant share of the increased taxes under most of the evaluated options, changes to corporate taxation had the highest cost of all of the policy options in number of jobs lost per $1 million of tax revenue raised, and the incidence of jobs lost across the sectors of the economy varied for each tax option.

Ernst & Young – Economic and Fiscal Impact Analysis of Maryland Tax Policy Options [full PDF]

The FY 2006 Economic Impact of Continuing Operations of the University of Connecticut Health Center (Fourth Report)

The economic and fiscal benefits of the presence of the University of Connecticut Health Center to the economies of Hartford County and the State of Connecticut was detailed in this report. The study analyzed the myriad activities of the Health Center due to the fact that these activities generate local and state tax revenue. The analysis used the REMI model to show that the $102 million state contribution of the Health Center in FY 2006 generated $707 million in new personal income, $938 million in new gross state product, $116 million in gross state and local tax revenue, $98 million in gross state and local expenditure, and over $18 million in net state and local tax revenue on average each year.

Connecticut Center for Economic Analysis – The FY 2006 Economic Impact of Continuing Operations of the University of Connecticut Health Center (Fourth Report) [full PDF]