Subject(s): Local finance -- Local government -- Metropolitan areas -- Metropolitan government -- Municipal services -- Study of local public economies : Distinguishing provision and production, logic of provision, preference revelation, fiscal equivalence, accountability, transaction costs as a limiting factor, logic of production, coproduction, economies of scale, coordination costs as a limiting factor, linking provision to production, metropolitan governance- equity, civil society -- Separating provision and production : Variation in contracting out, explaining the decision to contract out, relevance of provision arrangements, small local governments nonviable -- Organizing the provision side : Tyoes of provision units, default units, optional units, special case of special districts, RCAs and BIDs -- Organizing the production side : Service sector, foure service sector in two metro areas, police service, public education, streets, fire protection, coordination and mutual aid, industrial model, evaluating service sector -- Metropolitan governance - without metropolitan government : Local government constitutions, crafting government authorities, metropolitan civil society, metropolitan dynamics and adaptation - role of public entrepreneurship, maintaining metropolitan equity, alternative approaches to fiscal disparity problems, empirical research, political choice for disadvantaged communities -- Civic metropolis : Fragmentation works, standard explanation- local government competition, alternative or complementary explanations, application in rural areas and developing countries, principles of governance for local public economics, research/ reform agenda