State Data Sharing Initiative Reports Released!

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We invite you to learn more about how to improve your economic and workforce development outcomes by using evidence to drive decision making.  The Center for Regional Economic Competitiveness (CREC) just released the report, “Advancing State Data Sharing for Better Economic and Workforce Development” and the tool “Legal Guide to Administrative Data Sharing for Economic and Workforce Development” that offer important lessons for states interested in enabling the responsible use of administrative records for program research and analysis.

Access to administrative records – wage records and corporate tax filings – can be invaluable for making evidence-based policy decisions.  Yet accessing those records can be difficult.  During the past 18 months CREC has been working with five states to determine solutions to data sharing challenges as part of its State Data Sharing Initiative.  The lessons learned are:

  1. States can “get to yes” by addressing cultural barriers to data sharing
  2. Clearly articulate the laws governing data sharing
  3. States need to dedicate resources to data sharing efforts
  4. Data sharing advocates must manage up and down to gain and sustain support
  5. Standardizing data sharing processes creates meaningful progress

The Legal Guide covers common issues when negotiating an agreement to securely share data and sets out guidance that facilitate the responsible use of administrative data for evidence-based policy making to the full extent of federal and state laws.

CREC has worked on the State Data Sharing Initiative over the past two years to inform more rigorous analysis of economic and workforce development programs by better understanding the barriers to accessing administrative records responsibly.  The project included research on the legislation guiding data sharing in all 50 states, assessments of improvements to evaluation efforts that fully respect taxpayer privacy, and technical assistance to five states that agreed to take significant action on their data sharing policies over an 18-month engagement.  All the research can be found on the website: www.statedatasharing.org.

In addition to these two papers, the State Data Sharing Initiative website also includes a variety of resources including:

  • A summary of key legislative language in all 50 states, plus companion federal legislation
  • A research report on the barriers to data sharing in the 50 states
  • A legal guide for preparing data sharing agreement based on frequently asked questions
  • A toolkit of case studies and examples of successes linked to data sharing
  • A list of relevant publications about a variety of data sharing and management issues
  • An executive highlights report summarizing lessons learned from the project

Check out this free resource, brought to you by CREC with funding support from the Laura and John Arnold Foundation.