Expected Permanent Fund Dividends: New Measures Based on a Narrative Analysis and Archival Data

This paper derives two measures of expected Alaska Permanent Fund Dividends (PFD), which are large annual payments to most Alaskan residents. The first measure is based on a narrative analysis of all major Alaskan newspapers from 1982 to 2014. The second is derived from new data from 1991 to 2014 of the Permanent Fund's income from assets, which largely determines the size of the annual dividend per person. Additional information about the PFD is provided that will help those who plan to use this quasi-natural experiment for future research.