to Mayor Bart Peterson for helping us understand the dimension of local government consolidation in urban areas. Christopher Pece and Craig Langley at the U.S. Census Bureau were instrumental in identifying and providing pertinent data.
We also wish to thank the participants in the National Tax Association's 2009 Annual Conference on Taxation and the participants in the 2008 annual meeting of the Southern Regional Science Association, who provided considerable insight into many of the issues presented in this book.
The staff of the Center for Business and Economic Research was instrumental in the progress and completion of this book. Judy Lane, Jessica Booth, Jessica Tennant, Victoria Meldrum, Lisa Goodpaster, and Graham Watson either helped directly or bore the extra burden of work that was caused by our attention to this book.
A variety of students and staff provided research support for the book, including Alexander Falevich, Srikant Devaraj, Aswin Guntupalli, Joshua Doane, Whitney Ruble, Hikoyat Salimova, Keshia Atwood, Andrea Bogard, Colleen Walton, Katie Lewis, Shayna Smith, and Hilary Fichter.
Dagney's family—Larry, Delaney, and L.J.—and Michael's family—Janet, Morgan, Nathan, and John—unwittingly conspired to make this work happen through their support and their forbearance of our work schedules.