ABSTRACT
Local government service production is an urgent area of research. Metropolitan local governments have budgets and assets comparable to multi-national companies. The central question in the research on metropolitan policy-making is: How are services to be provided so that can cost productivity be achieved? Here we suggest that a macro index on cost productivity enhances our understanding of the variations in services and costs among metropolitan governments. This analysis of six Nordic metropolitan governments has the following chief findings: (1) Strong policy convergence in the soft sector; (2) Hesitance about service delivery mechanisms; (3) Clear differences in overall cost productivity.