Special Briefing: Outlook for 2026 - How States & Cities Will Adapt to Wrenching Change

The record-long federal government shutdown and congressional gridlock following passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act herald what is likely to be a year of painful adjustment for many US states, counties, and cities. Our panel of experts will discuss critical topics including the economic outlook, the likelihood of further Federal Reserve interest-rate cuts, the impact of sweeping cutbacks in Medicaid and other federal programs, and turmoil in bond markets as federal deficits produce an upsurge in short-term US Treasury borrowing.

Moderated by William Glasgall, Volcker Alliance Public Finance Adviser and Penn IUR Fellow, and Susan Wachter, Co-Director of the Penn Institute for Urban Research and Wharton Professor of Real Estate and Professor of Finance, this briefing is the sixty-fourth in a series of sixty-minute online conversations featuring experts from the national research networks of the Volcker Alliance and Penn IUR, along with other leading academics, economists, and federal, state, and local leaders. 

Special Briefings are made possible by funding from The Travelers Institute, the Volcker Alliance, and members of the Penn IUR Advisory Board. Recordings of the entire Special Briefings series are available on the Volcker Alliance or Penn IUR websites.

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Matt Fabian is a partner at Municipal Market Analytics (MMA), an independent research and consulting group that publishes data, analysis, and commentary on the US municipal bond market. MMA subscribers include institutional investors, underwriters, bond issuers, regulators, and think tanks. Matt is frequently quoted in the national and trade media on a broad range of topics connected to municipal bonds. He is also a regular speaker at industry conferences and private events.

Along with Lisa Washburn, Matt authors the weekly OUTLOOK report, which covers credit and market structure trends and federal policy and regulatory developments. Lisa and Matt also write the weekly DEFAULT TRENDS report, which tracks and analyzes troubled and defaulted municipal borrowers. Matt is the principal instructor for MMA’s Municipal Credit and Strategy Masterclass, an asynchronous learning module that provides 20 NASBA-approved CPE credits on completion.

Prior to MMA, Matt headed up US municipal research and strategy at UBS in New York City. He was also a credit analyst at the monoline bond insurer FSA and at Moody’s Investors Service. Matt served as chairperson of the Municipal Analysts Group of New York and has received the National Federation of Municipal Analyst’s Industry Contribution Award.

He has a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science from Penn State University and a Master of Public Administration from the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. 

Eric Kim is a Senior Director in Fitch Ratings’ U.S. public finance department and head of the U.S. states rating team. Eric joined Fitch in March 2007 and also worked in Fitch’s education and non-profit institutions group. Prior to Fitch Eric was at several transportation agencies for the City of New York and was a NYC Urban Fellow. Eric was a member of the Bond Buyer’s 2016 inaugural class of Rising Stars in the municipal finance industry and speaks regularly at national and regional conferences. Eric earned a BA from Brown University and an MPA with a public finance specialization from the Wagner School of Public Service at New York University. Eric is also a member of the Municipal Analysts Group of New York and serves on the Board of Governors for the National Federation of Municipal Analysts.

Allison Schrager is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, a contributing editor of City Journal, and a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. Her work focuses on economics including public finance, pensions, tax policy, labor markets, and monetary policy. She is the author of An Economist Walks Into a Brothel. Previously, Schrager was a journalist at Quartz, led retirement product innovation at Dimensional Fund Advisors, and consulted international organizations, including the OECD and IMF. She has been a regular contributor to the Economist, Reuters, and Bloomberg Businessweek, and her writing has also appeared in  Foreign Affairs,  National Review, The New York Times, Playboy, Wall Street Journal, and Wired.

She received her undergraduate degree from the University of Edinburgh and a Ph.D. in Economics from Columbia University.

Torsten Slok is Partner and Chief Economist at Apollo. Prior to joining in 2020, Torsten worked for 15 years on the sell-side, where his team was top-ranked by Institutional Investor in fixed income and equities for ten years. Previously, he worked at the OECD in Paris in the Money and Finance Division and the Structural Policy Analysis Division. Before joining the OECD, Torsten was with the IMF in the division responsible for writing the World Economic Outlook, and the division responsible for China, Hong Kong, and Mongolia.

Torsten studied at University of Copenhagen and Princeton University. He frequently appears in the media and has published numerous journal articles and reviews on economics and policy analysis, including in the Journal of International Economics, Journal of International Money and Finance, and The Econometric Journal.