Title: Elected versus appointed policymakers
Subtitle: evidence from city treasurers
Description: "This paper investigates whether methods of public official selection affect policymaking in cities.  I draw on the unique characteristics of California's city referendum process to identify the causal effect of city treasurers' method of selection on their cities' debt management policies.  I utilize a regression discontinuity strategy based on the effect of narrowly-passing appointive city treasurer referendums on city borrowing costs.  The results indicate that appointive treasurers reduce a city's cost of borrowing by 13% to 23%.  The results imply that if all cities in California with elected treasurers were to appoint them, total borrowing expenditures would be reduced by more than $20 million per year.  Appointive city treasurers appear to reduce borrowing costs primarily through the refinancing of expensive debt at lower interest rates"--National Bureau of Economic Research web site.