Publications

December 2012
Background Note

Jefferson County: Specific Swap Detail

Jefferson County, Alabama, faces an EPA mandate requiring sewer system upgrades. How will they finance the upgrades? What consequences will follow? View Details

Keywords: Local Government; Political Process; Bankruptcy; Debt Management; Financial Planning; Financial Management; Urban Development; City; Infrastructure; Government and Politics; Alabama

2024
Government Testimony

Budget Committee Testimony on Riskier Business: How Climate Is Already Challenging Insurance Markets

By: Ishita Sen

Keywords: Insurance; Climate Change

November 2011
Case

Envision Charlotte: Building an Energy Cluster

By: William W. George

Keywords: Energy; Industry Clusters; Economic Growth; Infrastructure; North Carolina

November 2014
Article

Government Green Procurement Spillovers: Evidence from Municipal Building Policies in California

By: Timothy Simcoe and Michael W. Toffel

We study how government green procurement policies influence private-sector demand for similar products. Specifically, we measure the impact of municipal policies requiring governments to construct green buildings on private-sector adoption of the U.S. Green Building... View Details

Keywords: Public Procurement; Green Building; Quality Certification; Environmental Policy; Buildings and Facilities; Environmental Sustainability; Policy; Government and Politics; Green Technology Industry; Public Administration Industry; California

Fast Answer

Government data and information sources for public entrepreneurship

list of 85 municipal open data sites Where can I find information on spending for local governments? You can find a variety of cities who make data available via easy to navigate “Open Budgets” Ex. View Details

07 May 2025
News

Scaling New Heights

Brianna Brown, chief product officer at City Fresh Foods in Boston. (Photo/video credit: Susan Young) City Fresh Foods has long served nutritious meals to students, seniors, and daycare centers in Greater Boston’s under-resourced communities. But when the company saw... View Details

Keywords: Jennifer Gillespie

01 Sep 2011
News

Making a Difference in the World

The City Solution: Facts and Figures p. 32 “half the world’s people ” U.N. Habitat report (“Cities and Climate Change – Global Report on Human Settlements”) March 2011 p. 33 “2 percent land mass most of its emissions.” UN Habitat Report... View Details

Keywords: Management, Scientific, and Technical Consulting Services; Professional Services

May 2018 (Revised October 2018)
Case

Urban Us

By: Mitchell Weiss and Phoebe Peronto

Shaun Abrahamson and Stonly Baptiste aimed to invest in what they called "urbantech superheroes." At Urban Us, the seed-stage urban technology-focused venture capital firm the two started in 2012, they looked for startups innovating around the future of cities. By... View Details

Keywords: Public Entrepreneurship; Govtech; Urbantech; Seed Investing; Urban Us; Shaun Abrahamson; Stonly Baptiste; Remix; One Concern; Starcity; SeamlessDocs; Venture Capital; Public Sector; City; Urban Development; Entrepreneurship; Miami; San Francisco; New York (city, NY)

2010
Chapter

The Agglomeration of U.S. Ethnic Inventors

By: William R. Kerr

The ethnic composition of US inventors is undergoing a significant transformation - with deep impacts for the overall agglomeration of US innovation. This study applies an ethnic-name database to individual US patent records to explore these trends with greater detail.... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Geographic Location; Patents; Ethnicity; City; Innovation and Invention; United States

SSRN

March 1, 2021
Article

Transitioning to Clean Energy Transportation Services: Life-cycle Cost Analysis for Vehicle Fleets

By: Stephen Comello, Gunther Glenk and Stefan Reichelstein

Comprehensive global decarbonization requires that transportation services cease to rely on fossil fuels for power generation. This paper develops a generic, time-driven life-cycle cost model for mobility services to address two closely related questions central to the... View Details

April 2019 (Revised December 2019)
Case

Exporting Livability: Investing in New Urban Centers

By: John D. Macomber and Essie Alamsyah

Can Singapore urban design, policy continuity, and system of laws be exported outside of Singapore to accelerate the effective development of new urban agglomerations? Nina Yang, CEO of Sustainable Urban Development at Ascendas-Singbridge, a large real estate company... View Details

Keywords: Urban Development; Projects; Design; City; Business and Government Relations; Expansion; Real Estate Industry; China; Singapore

05 Nov 2013
News

Start-Ups Get a Start in New Orleans

Kevin Wilkins by Constantine von Hoffman Just eight years after New Orleans was devastated by Hurricane Katrina, Kevin Wilkins (MBA 1992) says the city is poised to join Silicon Valley, Boston, and Austin (Texas) as one of the nation's... View Details

Keywords: New Orleans; Advertising, Public Relations, and Related Services; Professional Services

06 Nov 2017
Research Event

Who is Responsible for the Future of Cities?

CAMBRIDGE, Mass — On a rainy afternoon in late October, Mohsen Mostafavi stood before a packed auditorium at Harvard University and considered the history of cities in terms of three cooked eggs. Mostafavi, the Dean of the Harvard... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

2008
Working Paper

The Agglomeration of U.S. Ethnic Inventors

By: William R. Kerr

The ethnic composition of US inventors is undergoing a significant transformation—with deep impacts for the overall agglomeration of US innovation. This study applies an ethnic-name database to individual US patent records to explore these trends with greater detail.... View Details

Keywords: Information Technology; Geographic Location; Patents; Ethnicity; City; Innovation and Invention; United States

SSRN