For its entire history as a state, Alaska has made money, sometimes billions of dollars a year, by taxing the oil pumped from its wells. That 56-year winning streak is over. Alaskan leaders want to scale back subsidies designed to spur production by oil companies that have ballooned beyond expectations. Alaska is giving back more than $1 billion annually in tax credits and rebates to oil companies and Wall Street lenders, wiping out what had often been its largest source of income. In all, Alaska likely lost $263 million on its oil production tax program in the past year, state estimates show. While the subsidies have succeeded in drawing in exploration-and-production work, their costs began skyrocketing just before oil prices started plunging in mid-2014. That cost adds to the state’s financial troubles and is too high at a time when declining oil prices have drastically reduced the state budget, […]