Boosting Infrastructure Investment for Global Cities: Lessons from the $4 Trillion U.S. Municipal Bond Market

Global cities face mounting infrastructure demands at a time when fiscal pressures, climate risks, and constrained public resources are challenging traditional financing models. Against this backdrop, the $4 trillion U.S. municipal bond market has drawn increasing international attention as a model for financing long-term public investment. For a discussion of how municipal bond markets, fiscal decentralization, and subnational governance can support infrastructure investment in global cities, Penn IUR and the Volcker Alliance convened a panel of public finance and international development experts for “Special Briefing on Boosting Infrastructure Investment for Global Cities: Lessons from the $4 Trillion U.S. Municipal Bond Market” on May 14, 2026.

William Glasgall, Penn IUR Fellow and Public Finance Adviser at the Volcker Alliance, and Susan Wachter, Co-Director of Penn IUR, co-hosted the Special Briefing. The panel included:

• Emily S. Brock, Director, Federal Liaison Center, Government Finance Officers Association; • Alexander Chilton, Managing Director, Morgan Stanley Fixed Income & Commodities; • Sean Dougherty, Senior Advisor at Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and leader of the Secretariat of the Network on Fiscal Relations across Levels of Government; • Pietrangelo De Biase, OECD policy analyst; and • Paul Smoke, Director at New York University’s Center on International Cooperation (CIC) and Professor of Public Finance and Planning, NYU Wagner Graduate School of Public Service.