Budgetary balance: the norm, concept and practice in large U.S. cities

The ways in which budgetary balance affects the budgetary process in larger US cities were examined. Municipal budgetary behavior can't be successfully reduced to a single criterion. In a study, empirical evidence confirms and informs the general proposition that municipal budgets must be balanced. Findings show that budgetary balance is a common legal requirement and is articulated as an operative norm by participants in the budgetary process. Bridgeport, Connecticut's brief flirtation with bankruptcy cautions against overrating the power of balance as budgetary disciplinarian. Given the many devices for achieving formal compliance, balance need not and often does not translate into equivalency between current revenues and current expenditures. Municipal budgetary behavior cannot be reduced fruitfully to a single criterion, even one as widely accepted as budgetary balance.