Synopses & Reviews
State and local government fiscal systems have increasingly become vulnerable to economic changes. Over the past three decades, state and local deficits during economic recession have been larger and deeper each time. The impact of the Great Recession and its aftermath of feeble growth and lingering high unemployment has been dramatic both in scope and intensity. Before the crisis, long-term structural deficits were persistent for both individual governments and the entire sector as spending plans and patterns outpaced governments' revenue-generating capacity. The revenue systems of these governments eroded while the workloads and scope on the expenditure side of the state and local system budget continued to grow.
This handbook evaluates the persistent problems in the fiscal systems of state and local governments and what can be done to solve them. It contains 35 chapters authored by 60 practitioners and academics who are renowned scholars in state and local finance. Each chapter provides a description of the discipline area, examines major developments in policy, practices and research, and opines on future prospects. The chapters are divided into four sections. Section I is a systematic discussion of the institutional, economic, and political framework that provides a background for understanding the structure and financial performance of the state and local sector. The chapters in Section II provide an overview of the various components of state and local revenue systems and how they reacted to the Great Recession. They analyze the diverse forms of taxes and charges in detail, prescribe remedies and alternatives, and examine the implications for future revenue performance. Chapters in Section III turn to spending, borrowing and financial management in the state and local sector. The focus is on the big six service delivery sectors: education, health care, human services, transportation, pensions, and housing. Section IV is a set of chapters that look ahead and speculate about how the state and local government sector's money-raising, spending, and service delivery structures will adjust to the new circumstances.
Review
"The Oxford Handbook of State and Local Government Finance should be required reading for policy makers at all levels of government and for anyone interested in the health of the state and local sector. The Handbook addresses current and ongoing challenges facing state and local governments and the authors list reads like a Who's Who of state and local government experts."--Chris Hoene, Director, Center for Research and Innovation, National League of Cities
"Robert Ebel and John Petersen have assembled an all-star cast of academicians, practitioners, and public intellectuals who shine a bright light on a technically difficult-to-understand, yet certainly a most timely topic. The Oxford Handbook of State and Local Government Finance should be required reading not just for academics and practitioners who work in this field. It is a must-read for policy makers, candidates for public office, editorial offices of the popular media, and the everyday citizen all of whom can play a vital role in strengthening the underlying system of resource generation for public services. Ebel and Petersen's tome is an outstanding contribution to the contemporary debates."--Michael A. Pagano, Dean, College of Urban Planning and Public Affairs, University of Illinois at Chicago
"The 35 essays in this volume address a wide span of state and local government finance topics. The volume also provides useful, timely coverage of pension issues and of municipal default and bankruptcy. Recommended." --CHOICE
"[T]he book is edited by two experts whose extensive US experience has been widened and deepened by international aid work in fiscal decentralization and local government financial management. From this, they learned not only the knowledge gaps in their own country but also what sort of things matter to making societies sustainable with a set of outcomes that benefit the many." -- Public Administration and Development
About the Author
Robert D. Ebel is Research Professor of Economics at the University of the District of Columbia. For the period 2006-2009 he served as Deputy Chief Financial Officer for Revenue analysis and Chief Economist for the Washington, DC government. Earlier, Ebel was a Senior Fellow at the Urban Institute/Brookings Institution Tax Policy Center (TPC) and Lead Economist for the World Bank Institute's Capacity Building programs on Public Finance, Intergovernmental Relations, and Local Financial Management.
John Petersen is Professor of Public Policy and Finance at the School of Public Policy, George Mason University. Prior to joining the faculty, he was President and Division Director of the Government Finance Group, a financial research and advisory firm. Earlier, Petersen served as Senior Director of the Government Finance Research Center of the Government Finance Officers Association. Petersen has written the finance column for Governing Magazine for twenty years and in 2011 received the Ken Howard Lifetime Achievement Award from the Association for Budgeting and Financial Management.
Table of Contents
Foreword
Preface Robert D. Ebel and John E. Petersen
I. The Economic, Demographic and Institutional Framework
1. Introduction: State and Local Government Finance in the United States Robert D. Ebel, John E. Petersen and Ha T. T. Vu
2. The Constitutional Frameworks of State and Local Government Finance John Kincaid
3. Federalism Trends, Tensions and Outlook Timothy J. Conlan and Paul L. Posner
4. State and Local Government Finance: Why It Matters Serdar Yilmaz, François Vaillancourt, and Bernard Dafflon
5. State and Local Governments and the National Economy Rick Mattoon and Leslie McGranahan
6. Evolving Financial Architecture of State and Local Governments Sally Wallace
7. Profiles of Local Government Finance Christine R. Martell and Adam Greenwade
8. Federal Preemption of Revenue Autonomy James R. Eads, Jr.
9. State Intergovernmental Grant Programs Ronald C. Fisher and Andrew Bristle
10. State and Local Fiscal Institutions in Recession and Recovery Tracy M. Gordon
II. Impacts and Implications of the Great Recession: Current Revenues and Expenditures; Capital Budgeting, Borrowing and Debt
11. Real Property Tax Michael E. Bell
12. State Personal Income Taxes Joseph J. Cordes and Jason N. Juffras
13. State Corporate Income Taxes David Brunori
14. Entity Taxation of Business Enterprise LeAnn Luna, Matthew N. Murray and Zhou Yang
15. Implications of a Federal Value Added Tax for State and Local Governments Harley T. Duncan
16. Retail Sales and Use Taxation William F. Fox
17. Local Revenue Diversification: User Charges, Sales Taxes, and Income Taxes David L. Sjoquist and Rayna
Stoycheva
18. State Tax Administration: Seven Problems in Search of a Solution Billy Hamilton
19. Revenue Estimation Norton Francis
III. Direct Operating Expenditures
20. Providing and Financing K-12 Education Daphne Kenyon
21. The Social Safety Net, Health Care, and the Great Recession Thomas Gais, Donald Boyd, and Lucy Dadayan
22. Transportation Finance Jonathan L. Gifford
23 Housing Policy in the U.S.: The Evolving Subnational Role Robert M. Buckley and Alex F. Schwartz
IV. Capital Spending and Finance
24. Capital Budgeting and Spending Justin Marlowe
25. Financial Markets and State and Local Governments John E. Petersen and Richard Ciccarone
26. Infrastructure Privatization in the United States in the New Millennium Ellen Dannin and Lee Cokorinos
V. Further Impacts on Financial Activities and Processes
27. Financial Emergencies: Default and Bankruptcy James E. Spiotto
28. Government Financial Reporting Standards: Reviewing the Past and Present, Anticipating the Future Craig D. Shoulders and Robert J. Freeman
29. Pullback Management: State Budget Execution During Periods of Rapidly Declining Revenues Carolyn Boudreaux and W. Bartley Hildreth
30. Public Employee Pensions and Investments Siona Listokin-Smith
31. Accomplishing State Budget Policy and Process Reforms Iris J. Lav
32. Fiscal Austerity and the Future of Federalism Rudolph G. Penner
33. Achieving Fiscal Sustainability for State and Local Governments Robert B. Ward
34. The Intergovernmental Grant System Raymond C. Scheppach
35 Community Associations at Middle