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How Opportunity Zones Launched a ‘Gold Rush’ for Wealthy Investors

The place-based tax break program launched in 2017 as a means of revitalizing impoverished local economies. That’s not what happened, says author David Wessel. 

A former factory in the Port Morris neighborhood of the Bronx, one of the more than 8,000 low-income census tracts designated as Opportunity Zones. 

A former factory in the Port Morris neighborhood of the Bronx, one of the more than 8,000 low-income census tracts designated as Opportunity Zones. 

Photographer: David 'Dee' Delgado/Bloomberg
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The topic of economic development tax incentives tends to be pretty dry, but things get more interesting when you throw in a hard-charging Silicon Valley billionaire. 

After stepping away from his role as Facebook’s president, Napster founder Sean Parker was on a trip to Tanzania in 2007 when he hit on the idea of tapping the capital gains of rich people to fund new investments in impoverished communities, where they would spur economic growth. Or so he predicted.