In the cross-country literature, cognitive skills are robust predictors of economic growth. We investigate claims by psychologists that the same is true at the state level. In a variety of specifications using four proxies for average state IQ used in the psychology literature, little evidence...

There has been an international trend towards shifting the provision of public services down to lower levels of government. That decentralization has increased the relative importance of local governments. This paper examines the relationship between spending by those local governments and...