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County staff: data centers yield far more tax revenue but far fewer local operations jobs than alternatives
Summary
Baltimore County economic staff told the study group that a modeled large data-center example generates about 3.2 times the recurring tax revenue of comparable warehouse/manufacturing uses—driven largely by personal-property tax on IT equipment—but the facilities create relatively few permanent operations jobs (roughly 45) while producing large one-time construction employment.
Austin, manager of the Division of Data and Economic Analysis at DUDE, presented an economic and tax comparison for a hypothetical data center versus comparable warehousing/manufacturing on a single parcel. Using a full life-cycle peak‑operations approach and a 79‑acre, ~500,000‑square‑foot facility as the data‑center example, Austin said the project in the county model produced roughly 3.2 times the annual recurring tax revenue of the alternative uses — a result dominated by personal‑property tax on IT equipment.
"IT equipment comes in as by far the biggest tax revenue generator," Austin said, explaining that his model derived a $741 million IT-equipment cost and applied depreciation schedules to estimate annual personal‑property assessable value. In the illustrative table he shared, about $7.9 million of a $9.9 million annual recurring tax total came from personal‑property tax.
Austin cautioned the result is highly sensitive to policy choices: a 2020 state law permits counties to eliminate assessment of certain personal property in qualified data centers, and adopting that exemption would remove the modeled $7.9 million personal‑property tax benefit. He also noted that while data centers produce large construction employment (his model estimated roughly 2,000 construction jobs and associated one‑time income-tax receipts), ongoing operations create relatively few local jobs — Austin used about 45 full‑time operational positions in the example — so local wage and spending impacts from operations are limited.
The presentation assumed (unless otherwise specified) facility location within an enterprise zone and that 40% of workers live in Baltimore County (based on local commute patterns). Austin said local capture of the IT supply chain is limited because much hardware is manufactured abroad, and he advised caution about expecting data centers to catalyze broad tech-sector employment growth locally.
County staff asked about the frequency of personal‑property exemptions among large taxpayers; an OBF representative (Mike) said exemptions are likely in some cases but the county would need to review each account. Staff will circulate the slides and sources and may follow up with Austin for more detail as they draft the study.
