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The Center on Municipal Finance at the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy has partnered with InvestorTools, a fixed income software and data company, to make more data about the municipal finance sector available to scholars. This is the first step in expanding the Centre’s resources as it aims to become a leading destination for local government finance researchers.
Inspired by a decade-long program at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, this data distribution partnership will connect researchers seeking publication in academic journals with data points collected by Investortools and selected by the Center. Masu.
CMF Director Justin Marlowe said the center will adjust the data points based on feedback from researchers, who will be able to choose from a variety of data segments.

“We selected the data points that we thought were most in demand among researchers,” Professor Marlowe said, adding that InvestorTools’ decades of leadership in the municipal finance industry make this partnership a good fit for the university. He added that it was a victory.
“The company’s data from government financial statements is widely recognized as the most comprehensive and reliable in the industry,” he said. “And perhaps more importantly, they are thought leaders who believe that high-quality academic research brings tremendous value to practice.”
Investor Tools Gets Data
“It’s a pretty widespread accomplishment that’s actually making a difference,” Ciccarone said.
Few academics have access to the highest quality private-sector data, and the many hurdles to contracting with data vendors often end up using poor-quality data, says William Townsend of Harris College. said Christopher Berry, Friedman and Alicia Townsend Friedman Professor. school.
The new partnership will give academics access to Investortools data at a low cost, and the center will be responsible for administrative duties and vetting of researchers.
The Booth School partners with Nielsen Corporation through the school’s Quilt Center for Marketing.
“Our goal is to make CMF a similar kind of academic repository for private sector data in the municipal finance industry,” he said.
The partnership with Harris is already paying off. A group of researchers is currently using data from Investor Tools to examine how natural disasters affect the fiscal health of cities and counties, and whether climate adaptation plans act as a buffer. I’ve confirmed it. Another group studied nonprofit hospitals to see how their debt burdens affect their Medicaid and Medicare ratios to privately insured patients and the mix of elective and nonelective procedures performed there. ing.
The latter work is reminiscent of one of Merritt’s earliest sporadic partnerships with individual scholars.Thomas Prince, Professor, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University
These partnerships, which ushered in more comprehensive Harris School partnerships, helped Mr. Ciccarone understand how such collaborations could benefit both parties, he said.
“We’re going to learn a lot from this whole process,” he said. “All public finance will benefit from the insights developed with the help of this program.”
Marlow said that when screening researchers to apply to use the data, the center strives to answer questions no one has asked before or update previous knowledge with more recent results. Stated.
“The main criterion is whether researchers can articulate how their project will contribute to the academic literature,” he said. “Are we developing a new measure of an important concept? We’re interested if the potential contribution is clear and obvious.”
Jonathan Anderson, chief product officer at Investor Tools, said in a statement that the company hopes the partnership with the university will deepen understanding of public finance from academia to market participants.
“We have to speak more of a common language. That’s part of the goal,” Ciccarone said. “It starts with data.”
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