The Economic Contributions of the Kenai Peninsula Borough School District

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the economic significance of the Kenai Peninsula Borough School District within the Kenai Peninsula Borough. We use an Alaska-specific Input-Output (I-O) model created by Dr. Scott Goldsmith of ISER, which is custom designed for the Alaska economy to “relate changes in spending in a particular industry to total changes in jobs and income in the Alaska economy.1” In the 2009/2010 school year, the school district directly created 1468.4 jobs, and about $109 million dollars was spent in south central Alaska. Based on the results of the model, this created 628.6 jobs, mostly in the borough, but with some located in Anchorage. These figures highlight the school district's role in the private as well as the public sector of the Kenai Peninsula Borough economy.