Budgeting by Democracy: Choosing Municipal Bond Issues.

Much of the literature on municipal bond elections has focused on the financial and debt aspects of the resolution or what factors determine whether or not a resolution will pass. Previous research has focused on the effect of demographics, form of elections, and economic conditions, showing that these factors impact the passage of municipal bonds. Past research has also shown that political variables-such as partisanship or a politician's influence--also impact the outcome of bond votes. However, the factors that influence the type of municipal bond (i.e. infrastructure, recreation, public safety) that appears on the ballot have been relatively understudied. We address this hole in the literature by drawing upon public choice and policy agenda setting literatures to examine why some issues are chosen for bond measures over others. We use data from municipal bond elections in the state of Texas from 2005 to 2015 combined with city and individual level data and to examine the effect of political and demographic variables on municipal bond consideration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]