9th annual Municipal Finance Conference
Past Event
Day 1
The Municipal Finance Conference aims to bring together academics, practitioners, issuers, and regulators to discuss recent research on municipal capital markets and state and local fiscal issues. This year’s conference was a joint venture of The Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy at Brookings, the Rosenberg Institute of Global Finance at the Brandeis International Business School, the Olin Business School at Washington University in St. Louis, and the Harris School of Public Policy at the University of Chicago. This year’s conference was exclusively online.
PAST CONFERENCES:
Agenda
DAY ONE
Monday, July 13
From this Session
Mayor Libby Schaaf of Oakland
The Honorable Libby Schaaf
Mayor - City of Oakland, California
David Wessel
Director - The Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy
Senior Fellow - Economic Studies
From this Session
Panel 1: State and local response to COVID-19 pandemic
Lauren Larson (Governor’s Office of State Planning & Budgeting, CO)
Fitzroy Lee (Government of the District of Columbia)
Mike Pagano (University of Illinois at Chicago)
Louise Sheiner
The Robert S. Kerr Senior Fellow - Economic Studies
Policy Director - The Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy
From this Session
Panel 2: COVID-19 - Municipal bond market response and outlook
Patrick Brett (Citi)
Gary Hall (Siebert Williams Shank & Co.)
Kent Hiteshew (Federal Reserve Board)
Sarah Snyder (Ramirez & Co.)
Richard Ryffel
Professor of Finance Practice - Olin School of Business, Washington University in St. Louis
From this Session
Breakout session I
Track 1: Underwriting, competitive bidding, capital budgeting
Specialization investments and market power in the underwriting market for municipal bonds
Author: Dario Cestau (IE Business School)
Discussant: Brad Gewehr (Bank of America)
America’s trillion-dollar repair bill: Capital budgeting and the disclosure of state infrastructure needs (read the paper summary here»)
Authors: Camila Fonseca Sarmiento (University of Minnesota), Jie Tan (Zhejiang University) & Jerry Zhirong Zhao (University of Minnesota)
Discussant: Preston Niblack (Office of the New York City Comptroller)
Competitive bidding for primary offerings of municipal securities: More bids, better for issuers?
Author: Simon Wu (Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board)
Discussant: Jill Jaworski (Public Financial Management)
Christopher Berry
William J. and Alicia Townsend Friedman Professor - University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy and the College
Session Materials
From this Session
Track 2: Marijuana, high-quality liquid assets, early warning systems
Assessing existing local government fiscal early warning system through four state
case studies: Colorado, Louisiana, Ohio and Pennsylvania
Authors: Eric Scorsone (Michigan State University) & Natalie Pruett (London School of Economics & Political Science)
Discussant: Marc Joffe (Reason Foundation)
Marijuana liberalization and public finance: A capital market perspective on a public health policy (read the paper summary here»)
Authors: Stephanie Cheng, Gus De Franco & Pengkai Lin (Tulane University)
Discussant: Kim Rueben (Urban Institute)
Regulatory spillover: Evidence from classifying municipal bonds as high-quality liquid assets (read the paper summary here»)
Authors: Jacob Ott (University of Minnesota)
Discussant: Ivan Ivanov (Federal Reserve Board)
From this Session
DAY TWO
Tuesday, July 14
From this Session
Breakout session II
Track 1: Shadow banking, ETFs, conflicts of interest
The impact of the shadow banking sector on public finance (read the paper summary here»)
Authors: Chuck Boyer & Kelly Posenau (Chicago Booth School of Business)
Discussant: Matt Fabian (Municipal Market Analytics)
Do municipal bond exchange-traded funds improve market quality?
Author: Justin Marlowe (University of Chicago)
Discussant: Patrick Luby (CreditSights)
Conflicts of interest in municipal bond advising and underwriting
Author: Daniel Garrett (UPenn Wharton School of Business)
Discussant: Lori Raineri (Government Financial Strategies)
Daniel Bergstresser
Associate Professor of Finance - Rosenberg Institute of Global Finance, Brandeis International Business School
From this Session
Track 2: Business tax incentives, municipal bankruptcies
Impact of corporate subsidies on borrowing costs of local governments (read the paper summary here»)
Authors: Sudheer Chava, Baridhi Malakar & Manpreet Singh (Georgia Institute of Technology)
Discussant: Donnie Charleston (Urban Institute)
Evaluating state and local business tax incentives (read the paper summary here»)
Authors: Cailin Slattery (Columbia University) & Owen Zidar (Princeton University)
Discussant: Tim Bartik (W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research)
Capital investment, service solvency, and quality of life after municipal bankruptcy
Authors: Carolyn Abott (St. John’s University) & Akheil Singla (Arizona State University)
Discussant: Cate Long (Puerto Rico Clearinghouse)
Kim Rueben
Sol Price Fellow & Director of State and Local Finance Initiative - Urban Institute
From this Session
Plenary: Pensions amid low rates and COVID-19
Implications of the Covid recession on state and local government pension sustainability
Authors: Jamie Lenney (Bank of England), Finn Schuele (Brown University) & Louise Sheiner (Brookings Hutchins Center)
Sins of the past, present and future: Alternative pension funding policies
Authors: Robert Costrell & Josh McGee (University of Arkansas)
Public pension plan risk-sharing: Options and consequences
Authors: Don Boyd, Gang Chen & Yimeng Yin (University at Albany)
Discussant 1: Tom Aaron (Moody’s)
Discussant 2: Keith Brainard (National Association of State Retirement Administrators)
From this Session
Panel 3: Climate change and state/local governments
Chris Hartshorn (risQ)
Todd Metcalfe (Moody’s)
David Victor (Brookings Institution & University of California, San Diego)
Louise Sheiner
The Robert S. Kerr Senior Fellow - Economic Studies
Policy Director - The Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy
Session Materials
From this Session
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