By James E. Spiotto The Treaty of Paris ending the Spanish-American War of 1898 resulted in control of Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam and The Philippine Islands being given to the United States. Cuba in 1902 and The Philippines in 1946 were given independence. Puerto Rico...
Cities & States
Growth in Public Higher Education Debt Outstanding Outpaces All Other Major Municipal Bond Sectors
Public Higher Education Debt Outstanding Has Grown by Over 80% Since 2007 Leading All Other Major Municipal Bond Credit Sectors by Richard A. Ciccarone Municipal Bond Credit Sectors -- Ten Year Outstanding Debt Trend Based on municipal bond credit sector medians, ...
Commonwealth of Massachusetts Tops List of Negotiated Sales for Week of August 27, 2018
Featured Municipal Bond Issue, Week of August 27th, 2018: Commonwealth of Massachusetts General Obligation Bonds – $727 Million The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is issuing $727.1 million in general obligation bonds for the purposes of financing capital improvements...
Midwest Demographic, Economic, and Debt Factors: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
James Spiotto Looks at Approaches to Taxation and Leverage in the Midwest, Starting With Recent Regional Demographic, Economic, and Debt Characteristics This article is Part I of a series of looking at approaches state and local governments Midwest could take to tax...
Go South East (and West) If You Want to Follow the Crowd | State Migration Patterns
State Migration Patterns Show Challenges for the Rust Belt, but Complexities Abound The state of migration patterns in the United States from the Midwest and Northeast to the South and West has been known and discussed for decades, and there are signs that it may be...
The Economic Archetypes of America’s Cities: Going Beyond Urban vs. Rural
MuniNet Guide Talks with National League of Cities' Christiana McFarland to Discuss Going Beyond Urban vs. Rural in Understanding the Economic Characteristics of America's Localities The National League of Cities released the findings of their biennial survey on local...
State and Local Government Workforce Expands Nationwide in 2016
State and Local Government Workforce Expands Overall, Including Majority of States in 2016 by Jeffrey L Garceau State and local governments expanded their total workforce in 2016, according to new data from the U.S. Census Bureau. The 2016 Annual Survey of Public...
Re-Assessing the Credit Quality of America’s Cities in 2017 – Part One: Examining Financial Health Against a Backdrop of High Ratings
Are Credit Ratings Reflecting True Risk? More than two years ago, MuniNet published a five-part series on Assessing the Credit Quality of America's Cities, intended to examine and create a framework to analyze the financial health of cities. With this first...
Statement from Illinois Comptroller Regarding State Budget Crisis
Illinois Comptroller Susana Mendoza Lays Out Stark Truth in Direct Public Address Editorial, MuniNet Guide Staff The Illinois Comptroller Susana Mendoza set a good example, acting in a spirit of statesmanship, as a responsible elected state official on...
Fiscal Contagion: When Distressed Municipalities Put States and Local Clusters at Risk
by Richard A. Ciccarone When a municipal government suffers severe fiscal problems, be it a city, county, school district, utility district, or any other special purpose government, those problems have a tendency to impact or be shared by other governments. Bond...