Professor Martin Doyle
Duke University
Water & Wall Street: Water affordability and infrastructure finance in US Cities
The intersection of finance and urban infrastructure has been a central theme across geography. In the case of water, public infrastructure intersects finance and capital through the mechanisms of municipal bonds and household water bills. We developed a nationwide database of water utility rates and then quantified household water service affordability. We present an analysis of 255 utilities in 4 different metropolitan regions demonstrating how demographic sorting spatially distributes affordability challenges. We then place our results in the context of public infrastructure finance. The primary finance instrument for urban water infrastructure – tax exempt municipal bonds – concentrates interest payments to the highest wealth investors in the U.S. That is, while all households must pay a water bill, the financial benefits of municipal debt to finance infrastructure is unevenly distributed across the population of that city.
Martin Doyle is a professor at Duke University with research at the intersection of water science, policy, and finance. He is the author of two books, The Source – a history of America’s Rivers, and Streams of Revenue (with Rebecca Lave) – a study of environmental markets. He is currently Senior Advisor to the Assistant Secretary of the Army.