GASB 77 Reporting by the Five Largest Cities in Each State (2019)

Updated 06/11/2020

Statement No. 77 on Tax Abatement Disclosures (GASB 77) set forth by the Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) requires GAAP-compliant public budgets to report how much revenue the government body loses yearly to economic development tax abatement programs. Good Jobs First tracks these new disclosures as part of its mission to promote transparency and accountability.

The 144 cities that have published FY 2019 financial statements and included GASB 77 disclosures reported a total of $5.03 billion (New York City accounts for more than half). Thirty-one of them abated more than $10 million in FY 2019. 48 cities did not make GASB 77 disclosures in their financial statements (indicating no abatements, immaterial abatements, or non-compliance. Click on the link below to see the list of programs in each city and the cost of each to the reporting government.

Note: GASB 77 disclosure reflects only the revenue loss for the reporting jurisdiction. The revenue loss may be caused directly by a government’s own abatement or result from abatements entered into by other governments. Therefore, the numbers below are the cities’ portion of taxes abated and do not include additional revenue that may have been lost by counties and school districts.

Download the excel spreadsheet to see program details (xlsx, 30 KB)