Local Leaders and the Pursuit of Growth in U.S. Cities: The Role of Managerial Skill
62 Pages Posted: 16 Jul 2020 Last revised: 7 Mar 2022
Date Written: March 1, 2022
Abstract
The question of whether and how city leaders matter for local economic outcomes re- mains an open empirical debate. We contribute to this research agenda by studying the effects of managerial skill—a dimension of leadership that has received little attention due to measurement challenges. We conduct an original phone survey on the management practices of over 300 mayors and city managers across the U.S. Using a difference-in-differences design that holds fixed a rich battery of individual and city- level characteristics, we examine how changes in leadership affect within-city changes in demographic and financial outcomes. We find that when local leaders employ management practices associated with organizational success, their cities grow across a range of indicators. These results are strongest for the subset of leaders who mention a growth-related goal for their time in office, suggesting that managerial skill allows local leaders to more effectively achieve their objectives.
Keywords: U.S. Cities, Mayors, City Managers, Managerial Skill, Elite Survey, Urban Politics
JEL Classification: P16, R51
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation