The Journal of the American Planning Association singles out one article a year for special recognition. This year, the journal's best article award goes to "The Failures of Economic Development Incentives," by Alan Peters and Peter Fisher. The article appeared in the Winter 2004 issue.

Here is what the judges had to say: "The authors address an important public policy issue with a definitive study of why monetary incentives don't work to the community's advantage. It is a timely study in the current period of declining local and state government budgets and increasing pressures of attracting jobs through incentives for employers. This paper does an excellent job of explaining why such incentives don't work. It is must reading for all economic development professionals."

From Planning March 2005