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House prices and city revenues

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  • Doerner, William M.
  • Ihlanfeldt, Keith R.

Abstract

Very little is known about what impact recent large upward and downward swings in single-family home values have had on local government budgets. Using a unique 15-year panel of Florida cities that includes both detailed revenue and house price data, we investigate the pathways whereby a change in house price may affect city revenue per capita and test for symmetric effects during housing booms and busts. For the median-sized city, we find that while increases in house price raise revenues, decreases in price have no effect on revenues. In addition, the former impact is small in magnitude. While the strongest pathway is through assessed values, our results illustrate that a change in house price can also affect other sources of revenue besides ad valorem taxes. The overall conclusion is that movements in Florida housing markets are only weakly related to a city's property taxes and total revenues per capita, which fails to support the argument portrayed in the popular press that house price changes strongly impact local budgets.

Suggested Citation

  • Doerner, William M. & Ihlanfeldt, Keith R., 2011. "House prices and city revenues," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(4), pages 332-342, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:regeco:v:41:y:2011:i:4:p:332-342
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    1. Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff, 2009. "The Aftermath of Financial Crises," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(2), pages 466-472, May.
    2. Alm, James & Buschman, Robert D. & Sjoquist, David L., 2011. "Rethinking local government reliance on the property tax," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(4), pages 320-331, July.
    3. Case, Karl E & Shiller, Robert J, 1989. "The Efficiency of the Market for Single-Family Homes," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(1), pages 125-137, March.
    4. Lutz, Byron & Molloy, Raven & Shan, Hui, 2011. "The housing crisis and state and local government tax revenue: Five channels," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(4), pages 306-319, July.
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    Cited by:

    1. Albert Solé-Ollé & Elisabet Viladecans-Marsal, 2011. "Local spending and the housing boom," Working Papers 2011/27, Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB).
    2. William M. Doerner & Keith Ihlanfeldt, 2012. "An Empirical Analysis of the Property Tax Appeals Process," Working Papers wp2012_01_01, Department of Economics, Florida State University, revised Jul 2014.
    3. Albert Solé-Ollé & Elisabet Viladecans-Marsal, 2017. "Housing booms and busts and local fiscal policy," Working Papers XREAP2017-14, Xarxa de Referència en Economia Aplicada (XREAP), revised Dec 2017.
    4. Justin Ross & Wenli Yan & Craig Johnson, 2015. "The Public Financing Of America'S Largest Cities: A Study Of City Financial Records In The Wake Of The Great Recession," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55(1), pages 113-138, January.
    5. Agnese Sacchi & Simone Salotti, 2017. "The influence of decentralized taxes and intergovernmental grants on local spending volatility," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 51(4), pages 507-522, April.
    6. Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff, 2009. "The Aftermath of Financial Crises," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(2), pages 466-472, May.
    7. Ihlanfeldt, Keith R. & Willardsen, Kevin, 2014. "The millage rate offset and property tax revenue stability," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 167-176.
    8. Albert Solé-Ollé & Elisabet Viladecans-Marsal, 2011. "Local spending and the housing boom," Working Papers 2011/27, Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB).
    9. Solé-Ollé, Albert & Viladecans-Marsal, Elisabet, 2019. "Housing booms and local spending," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 113(C).
    10. Chernick, Howard & Langley, Adam & Reschovsky, Andrew, 2011. "The impact of the Great Recession and the housing crisis on the financing of America's largest cities," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(4), pages 372-381, July.
    11. Chernick, Howard & Reschovsky, Andrew & Newman, Sandra, 2021. "The effect of the housing crisis on the finances of central cities," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(C).
    12. Ross, Justin M. & Yan, Wenli, 2013. "Fiscal Illusion From Property Reassessment? An Empirical Test of the Residual View," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 66(1), pages 7-32, March.
    13. Alm, James & Buschman, Robert D. & Sjoquist, David L., 2011. "Rethinking local government reliance on the property tax," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(4), pages 320-331, July.
    14. Steven Gordon, 2019. "The Returns to Lobbying: Evidence from Local Governments in the “Age of Earmarksâ€," Public Finance Review, , vol. 47(5), pages 893-924, September.
    15. Goodman, Christopher B, 2018. "House Prices & Property Tax Revenues During the Boom & Bust: Evidence from Small-Area Estimates," SocArXiv fam2d, Center for Open Science.
    16. Siodla, James, 2020. "Debt and taxes: Fiscal strain and US city budgets during the Great Depression," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    House prices City revenues Ad valorem;

    JEL classification:

    • H20 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - General
    • H71 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue
    • R20 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Household Analysis - - - General

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