Missouri taxpayers spent around $151 million over the last decade luring companies from Johnson and Wyandotte counties in Kansas a few miles across the state line to Jackson County.
And according to research by the Hall Family Foundation, Kansas reciprocated by spending $184 million enticing border-hopping companies to flee Jackson County for Johnson and Wyandotte.
It’s an economic border war that’s raged for years in the Kansas City metro. And to its critics, it’s long past time for a truce.
“We’re using [economic development incentives] to divide the pie,” said Bill Hall, president of the Hall Family Foundation and longtime Kansas City metro area civic leader, “not increase the pie.” According to the Hall Family Foundation research, the combined $335 million spent by Missouri and Kansas since 2010 resulted in a net of about 1,200 jobs to Kansas.
(Read more: KC Star Local News)