State and Local Government Debt in the Postwar Period

Abstract

ONE of the most important developments in public finance in the post-World War II period has been the great growth of state and local government debt. From a level of $15,900,000,000 in fiscal 1946, state and local government gross debt outstanding has more than quadrupled, to $69,800,000,000 in fiscal 1960.' This study is concerned with the factors affecting the volume and timing of state and local government new debt issues.2 An attempt is made here to develop comprehensive econometric models explaining post-war state government and local government new debt patterns. While in most studies of municipal debt no distinction is made between state governments and local governments, respectively, in the present study it was found that such a distinction is crucial to an adequate comprehension of the factors affecting the new debt issues. Therefore, the next two sections are devoted to separate analyses of state debt and local debt.