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on Economic Geography |
| By: | Mª Jesus Santa Maria Beneyto; Jose Miguel Giner Perez; Antonio Fuster Olivares |
| Abstract: | A range of quantitative techniques have been employed by researchers in economic geography and other social science disciplines to measure and, spatially, define agglomerations of industrial activity. However, the application of these techniques in the literature results in a low consistency level. Because of this, new quantitative techniques have introduced solutions to solve the problems founded in the location’s analysis. One of these problems is the discrimination between geographic concentration arising from individual plants locating near to each other and that due to the concentration in an industrial structure. A relevant limitation of traditional location indexes is the absence of data about the differences in the size distribution of firms between geographic units. Recent papers by Ellison and Glaeser (1997) and Maurel and Sédillot (1999) have proposed indexes designed to measure agglomerations or geographic concentrations in excess of that which would be expected given industrial concentrations. These measures are all based on the distribution of activity over discrete geographic units. Another problem is the use of arbitrary cut-off values for determining what level of industrial specialization defines an agglomeration. O’Donoghue and Gleave (2004) have proposed a new measure, the ‘standardized location quotient (SLQ)’, which recognizes agglomerations as being comprised of locations with statistically significant location quotient values for the industry/activity under analysis. Other questions that appear when constructing these measures are the specification of the regional division’s level and the suitable use of administrative territorial units. New quantitative techniques of spatial econometrics solve this question. The use of a spatial autocorrelation indexes will allow us to know if the location of a concrete economic activity in a municipality is influenced by the location of the same activity in other neighbouring municipalities. We use global spatial autocorrelation statistics as I Moran Index (Moran, 1948) and Local Measures of Spatial Autocorrelation (LISA). The cluster map (LISA map) shows the significant locations by type of association. With LISA map, we measure geographic concentration of employment in industry clusters by detecting spatial association patterns in administrative areas (in this case, municipalities). In the empirical analysis the municipality, the micro level of administrative regions (NUTS5) in Spain, will be used as territorial unit. The data will be provided by the Industrial Register (Ministry of Industry, 2000) that contains information about the population of production plants in Spain at two and/or three-digit industry level. This includes the location of the plant (given by municipality), the plant’s three-digit industrial classification and the number of employees. So, the objective of this work will be to identify spatial agglomerations within the Spanish industrial sectors using all these new contributions to the spatial analysis and, as a secondary objective, to compare the difference of the results obtained with each quantitative technique. The results will offer a wide view of the geographic concentration and agglomeration of industrial activity in Spain. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p492&r=geo |
| By: | Boris A. Portnov |
| Abstract: | The present analysis of urban clusters (UCs) in Canada deals with two matters of immediate interest: a) investigating the spatial autocorrelation of development levels in towns within such clusters, and b) ascertaining the physical sizes of UCs in Canada (i.e. the spatial extent of the area of strong inter-town development association). The present analysis leads to three general conclusions: •First, development levels of neighbouring towns in UCs of Canada tend to be closely associated, though the intensity of such a development association generally tends to decline as inter-town distances increase. As argued, this spatial association of development rates may be due to the fact that both private investors and migrants consider UCs as integrated functional units, and make their location decisions hierarchically: first, among or between town clusters, and then among or between individual towns in a 'preferred' cluster. •Second, the effect of clustering on urban growth is not uniform. It is stronger in peripheral UCs (specifically in respect to unemployment and income variables), while in centrally-located ones the development levels of neighbouring towns are less interdependent. In general, distances within which inter-town development linkages are sufficiently strong to affect or promote clustering vary with the range practicable for daily commuting, that is, from 20-40 km in the country's core and 60-100 km in its periphery. •Third, the effect of spatial proximity of towns on their functional linkages differs in respect to different development measures. In particular, as found from our analysis of Canada's core areas, only population and housing variables exhibit strong spatial associations, while the effect of spatial factors on employment-related variables – average income and unemployment rate – is weaker. This dissimilarity represents fundamental differences between these two groups of variables. That is, while population and housing variables may be confidently associated with the clustering of residents in socially homogenous areas, the spatial association of employment-related variables may be influenced by inter-urban commuting. Thus, low unemployment in a town may reflect the availability of employment in the larger region rather in the town itself, which is an important caution about the care that needs to be taken in correctly selecting and interpreting indicators of urban functionality and growth potential. An important strategic finding of the present investigation is that local towns appear to follow the path of the central city over time, and local towns adjacent to a wealthy city are likely to perform better than those around a less-prosperous central locality. This result indicates that urban growth may spread across individual towns in both core and peripheral UCs, which has implications for urban and regional development policies and programs at the municipal, provincial and federal levels of government. In particular, the findings of the present analysis thus support the creation and stimulation of UCs in areas where further urban growth is desired. According to this strategy, development resources should be concentrated on selected UCs until they become sufficiently attractive to migrants and private developers. Support of the selected localities should, of course, include a balanced investment in both the housing development and employment-generating sectors. In addition to direct government intervention, various forms of indirect involvement, such as incentives for private investors and tax exemptions can be applied. Then, and based on evidence derived from the application of impact assessment procedures, as soon as the growth of the selected UCs becomes sustainable support may be redirected to other UCs. This hierarchical concentration of resources can then be shifted into more remote areas. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p137&r=geo |
| By: | Martin T.W. Rosenfeld; Peter Franz; Gerhard Heimpold |
| Abstract: | Throughout the literature in regional economics, most authors agree that spatially concentrated industrial activities are important for regional economic growth. Agglomeration economies, which may occur in the context of spatial concentration and “clusters“, may lead to lower costs of production and may reduce transaction costs of all kind, e. g. information costs, including the costs for R&D activities. There is much less agreement on (and: knowledge about) the empirical identification of existing spatially concentrated economic activities in the real world. For the last decade, the discussion on spatial concentration has been dominated by praising the benefits of economic “clusters“. Many case studies on regions with economic “clusters“ are describing how the mechanisms of these specific “clusters“ work. But there have been only a few attempts, so far, to look at a greater region or even at an economy as a whole, in order to find out – with empirical data which allow to compare between the sub-regions – for all sub-regions what their specific „competences“ in the field of spatially concentrated industrial activities are and whether there is a typical spatial pattern of concentrated industrial activities. The proposed paper is presenting the empirical results of a study on spatially concentrated industries in the Eastern part of Germany, where the current regional policy scheme, which de facto follows the “watering can principle”, is under debate. In the first part of the paper, the possible dimensions and the “ingredients” of economic “clusters“ and industrial agglomerations will be discussed. One important dimension is the existence of intra-regional value-added chains for certain products. But, at the moment, it is not possible to identify such value-added chains by using existing empirical data at the more aggregated levels of an economy. Therefore, our study and the paper are concentrating on just three main dimensions of economic “clusters” and industrial agglomerations: (1.) Particular high spatial concentrations of certain industries are identified (based on employment data by NACE 2 digit level) for all East German counties. (2.) The existence of business networks (and their main characteristics, e. g. industry classification) in the East German regions is discovered by a broad exploration of internet sources and an inquiry among regional development agencies. (3.) Spatially concentrated innovation activities are recorded for each region by using data on patent applications (by IPC classes). It will be discussed in the paper what is implicated with these three dimensions and their operationalization with empirical data. Finally, the findings from the first three steps of research are synthesized for showing how sectoral concentration, business networking and innovation competencies in the individual regions are overlapping. The findings reveal that spatially concentrated industries are mainly located in and around the largest East German cities in Saxony and Thuringia, and in Berlin and its hinterland. In contrast, a number of less densely populated, rural or former industrialized areas in the northern and central parts of East Germany have no or only some elements of spatially concentrated industries. The presented method for identifying spatially concentrated industries could be applied to other regions and economies for bringing more light into the debate on economic “clusters“. With regard to regional policy in East Germany, one may conclude from our findings that the present use of the “watering can principle” had not been able to stimulate economic agglomerations in economically weak peripheral regions. It could be a better strategy to support the existing “clusters” and industrial agglomerations. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p583&r=geo |
| By: | Reinhold Kosfeld; Christian Dreger |
| Abstract: | Changes in production and employment are closely related over the course of the business cycle. However, as exemplified by the laws of Verdoorn (1949, 1993) and Okun (1962, 1970), thresholds seem to be present in the relationship. Due to capacity reserves of the firms, output growth must exceed certain levels for the creation of new jobs or a fall in the unemployment rate. While Verdoorn's law focuses on the growth rate of output sufficient for an increase in employment, in Okun's law, the fall in the unemployment rate becomes the focus of attention. In order to assess the future development of employment and unemployment, these thresholds have to be taken into account. They serve as important guidelines for policymakers. In contrast to previous studies, we present joint estimates for both the employment and unemployment threshold. Due to demographic patterns and institutional settings on the labour market, the two thresholds can differ, implying that minimum output growth needed for a rise in employment may not be sufficient for a simultaneous drop in the unemployment rate. Second, regional information is considered to a large extent. In particular, the analysis is carried out using a sample of 180 German regional labour markets, see Eckey (2001). Since the cross-sections are separated by the flows of job commuters, they correspond to travel-to-work areas. Labour mobility is high within a market, but low among the entities. As the sectoral decomposition of economic activities varies across the regions, the thresholds are founded on a heterogeneous experience, leading to more reliable estimates.The contribution to the literature is twofold. First, to the best of our knowledge, no previous paper has investigated a similar broad regional dataset for the German economy as a whole before. By using a panel dataset, information on the regional distributions around the regression lines as well as theirs positional changes is provided for each year. Second, the methods applied are of new type. They involve a mixture of pooled and spatial econometric techniques. Dependencies across the regions may result from common or idiosyncratic (region specific) shocks. In particular, the eigenfunction decomposition approach suggested by Griffith (1996, 2000) is used to identify spatial and non-spatial components in regression analysis. As the spatial pattern may vary over time, inference is conducted on the base of a spatial SUR model. Due to this setting, efficient estimates of the thresholds are obtained. With the aid of a geographic information system (GIS) variation of the spatial components can be made transparent. With Verdoorn’s and Okun’s law the figures show some significant patterns become obvious over time. In respect to Verdoorn’s law, for instance, a stripe of high values in the north-western part from Schleswig-Holstein via Lower Saxony and North Rhine Westfalia to Rhineland Palatinate is striking in all years but 1994 and 1995. In most periods the spatial component is likewise concentrated in Saxony. Clusters of low values can be found in northern Bavaria and, in some periods, in Thüringen and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. Other parts of Germany appear to be more fragmented consisting of relative small clusters of low, medium and high values of the spatial component. With Okun’s law some changing spatial patterns arise. In all, spatially filtering provides valuable insights into the spatial dimensions of the laws of Verdoorn and Okun. Threshold employment and unemployment, regional labour markets, spatial filtering techniques, spatial SUR analysis |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p39&r=geo |
| By: | Darcin Akin; Esra Demircioglu |
| Abstract: | Due to the dynamic nature of the urban development in developing countries in parallel to rapidly changing economic, social and technological environments, decisions based on master plans do usually fail. Therefore, spatial transformation is the number one prerequisite to create more livable cities in countries where land use and location decisions do greatly divert from master plans that ill-fully represent the nature of urban development in rapidly changing environment. It is very unfortunate that like many developing countries, central government as well as local governments in Turkey have adopted this approach which is totally inappropriate to their changing environment due to rapid urbanization. In middle and low income economies, urbanization has increased by an average of 3.5 and 3.7% per annum, respectively, compared with an average of 1.5% per annum in the industrialized countries (the rate in Turkey was 4.35% from 1965 to 1985). The percent of urban population in the largest city in Turkey, Istanbul, was 24% in 1980 compared to 18% in 1960. The population of Istanbul was 11.2 million in 2000 compared to 11.3 million of Paris and 11.1 million of Osaka, Kobe (World Development Report by World Bank, 1984). In the periphery of the metropolitan city of Istanbul, there are numerous neighborhoods and urban centers hat need spatial transformation or renewal for the betterment of urban space. Renewal was defined as clearance and redevelopment until the mid-1960s. This approach for the urban betterment was changed in the 1970s by establishing legal ground via improvement and development plans. In contrast to this, in parallel to the radical changes in economic policies in the 1980s, renewal policy for the problematic locations in large urban areas were again equaled regeneration, and spatial transformations were made for the capitalization of global interests in the name of urban rent by transformation projects (Dündar, 2001). The former— improvement and development plans— failed due to the reason said in the beginning. The latter— transformation projects— have found limited application (Portakal Çiçeði, Dikmen Vadisi, Zafer Plaza transformation projects and some others) due to two great limitations: finances and public acceptance towards transformation projects. To overcome these obstacles in general, some approaches are developed, such as ÝHT-ÝHTr-Real-estate planning tools, master plans for earthquakes and natural disasters (Istanbul Metropolitan City), KED Model (Çelikhan et al., 2004). However, these approaches have not found widespread application yet due to necessary legal changes they require and most importantly the finances needed for the transformations desired in urban areas. Under the economic and social conditions in developing countries, what expected from ideal transformation approaches are to create financial tools during the process and to offer the urban rent to land owners primarily in order to speed up the transformation process towards the desired direction by creating voluntarily participation at the utmost level and to reduce the legal problems due to the introduction of new developments and land use planned by the transformation projects to be applied. This study is originated from the idea that large urban developments attract new land uses and users to their proximity or repel current land uses and users around them. This process can be seen as a “voluntarily transformation” process. Since large shopping centers or malls are built in almost every largely populated urban area all over the world in the last 20-30 years due to new shopping habits and global capital investments, we studied the effects of large shopping malls on land use in their proximity as being large developments they create urban transformation process in their proximity, as a case study in Istanbul, Turkey. To support our approach, Dennis at al. (2002) interestingly reported in their study in Northern London that the fist step in urban renovation is to renovate retail shopping and shopping centers. In this context, we performed user surveys in residential and commercial areas as well as at real estate agents in the proximity two large shopping centers; namely, Akmerkez (Etiler, Beþiktaþ) and Tepe-Nautilus (Acýbadem, Kadýköy) in Istanbul. In addition, in the study areas the data on land use changes provided by State Statistics Institute of Turkey have been examined. It is concluded the shopping centers stimulated urban transformation on real estates in their close proximity, and in time they created transformations from residential to commercial within their primary influence boundaries, and beyond those up to a certain distance they became an attractive zone for residential use. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p616&r=geo |
| By: | Igor Pilipenko |
| Abstract: | The cluster concept has been attracting a special attention of scholars and policymakers since almost 15 years due to considerable contribution of its theoretical results to practical rising of national and regional competitiveness. The concept of territorial-industrial complex (TIC) elaborated by Soviet regional economists and economic geographers in 1920-1980s realised the idea of optimisation of industrial production within a certain territory in the planning economy according to its endowments of natural and labour resources. At the first sight, these two concepts have many things in common, but in reality they have many differences. First, they were elaborated in different economic systems, which have various aims of economic activity. Secondly, clusters and TICs have different genesis, because in case of TICs theoretical and applied research resulted in practical construction of TICs, while clusters are generally forming themselves as a result of the market “invisible hand”. Thirdly, clusters and TICs are normally located in different types of regions: clusters tend to form in within agglomerations, while TICs were constructed mainly in newly developed regions with low population density. Fourthly, they differ also in terms of their structure. Clusters are groups of companies from one or related in industries often connected to R&D institutions and government structures, but TICs are inter-industrial complexes that involve production chains between different industries. Fifthly, cluster firms specialise in production of buyer-oriented good and services, while TICs' plants and factories represented producer-oriented heavy industries and machinery. Sixthly, the role of information flows between cluster SMEs and their staffs makes one of key distinctions between these two concepts. Seventhly, higher wages in cluster labour pools and higher productivity in cluster firms lead to raising of regional competitiveness while in the concept of TICs people are considered to be one of factors of TIC's development as well as natural resources, infrastructure, etc. A general weak development of SMEs in Russia restricts so far the development of regional/local clusters, but nevertheless some examples of local clusters can be found. One of them is an expanding cluster of small and medium IT-enterprises in Novosibirsk (Western Siberia) that has been developing since the beginning of 1990s in the region that inherits its original industrial specialization from TICs. The cluster firms have tight connections to R&D institutions from Akademgorodok (Science city), Novosibirsk State University, and Technopark Novosibirsk; the intensive information flows and exchange of know-how can be observed between cluster firms and their staffs; the productivity and wages within cluster are higher than in surrounding districts. Development of clusters of SMEs makes differences between clusters and TICs more obvious. The further development of Russian economy may lead to its dual spatial structure – combination of big and medium plants established within TIC concept till the end of 1980s and clusters of SMEs developing since the beginning of 1990s in agglomerations. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p70&r=geo |
| By: | Karlsson, Carlie (Department of Economics, Jönlöping International Business School, Jönköping University); Gråsjö, Urban (Department of Economics, Jönlöping International Business School, Jönköping University); Andersson, Martin (Department of Economics, Jönlöping International Business School, Jönköping University) |
| Abstract: | Knowledge is maintained as a core variable for growth in a large set of contemporary theories. In this paper, we analyze the relationship between knowledge accessibility and regional growth. The knowledge resource used in our model R&D conducted at universities and in companies. A precise definition of accessibility was introduced and calculations were based on actual travel time distances. Using data at the municipality level in Sweden, the hypothesis that knowledge accessibility has a positive effect on growth cannot be rejected. The knowledge accessibility in a given period has a statistically significant effect on the growth in value-added per employee in subsequent periods. The total accessibility of a municipality was divided into three types, (i) intra-municipal accessibility, (ii) intra-regional accessibility and (iii) extra-regional accessibility. The paper has shown that this division gives a clear indication of that there is spatial dependence in the sense that the knowledge resources in a given municipality tend to have a positive effect on the growth of another municipality, conditional on that the municipalities belongs to the same functional region. Thus, the results of the analysis indicate that knowledge flows transcend municipal borders, but that they tend to be bounded within functional regions. The findings in the paper provide support for the theories that emphasize the role of knowledge for growth. However, the paper demonstrates that spatial proximity to knowledge resources is important to materialize the positive effect of such resources. Accessibility to knowledge in space is thus imperativ |
| Keywords: | knowledge; R&D; economic growth; accessibility; spatial; region; spillovers |
| JEL: | O30 O40 O52 R11 |
| Date: | 2006–05–31 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:cesisp:0066&r=geo |
| By: | Maria Sole Brioschi Brioschi; Lucio Cassia; Alessandra Colombelli |
| Abstract: | 1. Aims of the paper: in this paper we analysed a number of European regions that in the last ten to fifteen years experienced a process of industrial reconversion moving from traditional sectors-based economies to knowledge economies. With the aim of shaping the transformation paths driving their competitiveness recovery, the analysis was conducted on two levels. First, we tried to identify the most relevant factors of competitiveness behind each region’s renewal process and combined them to shape a number of common trajectories of regional competitiveness. Secondly, we outlined a taxonomy of transformation paths followed by each of the territories under investigation in their development process towards a knowledge economy. Interestingly, all regional ‘success histories’ are strongly dependent on the presence of a tri-polar regional innovation system (RIS) ‘gluing’ firms, institutions and academia. 2. Factors and trajectories of regional competitiveness: Some of the factors of regional competitiveness identified in the analysis (exhaustively listed and described in the full paper) are entrepreneurial motivation, managerial skills, access to private and public financing, the presence of a local technical university. By combining the competitiveness factors specific to each regional ‘success history’, we were able to spot a number of trajectories of regional competitiveness : (i) the Nokia economies trajectory, (ii) the knowledge creation upon invitation trajectory and (iii) the Cambridge way trajectory. The first trajectory includes the Nordic regions of Tampere and Goteborg. The leading factors of development of these regions can be brought back to the successful development strategies of Ericsson and Nokia, in turn based on excellent managerial and organisational skills and a strong international orientation. The second trajectory of regional competitiveness refers to Ireland, Scotland and Wales, characterized by an ‘industrialisation upon invitation’ type of growth based on foreign direct investments. The policy of FDI attraction is largely supported by public incentives and owes its success to the leading role taken up by regional development agencies. The last trajectory of regional competitiveness relates to the high tech cluster of Cambridge (UK), emerged and developed essentially thanks to the active role of Cambridge University in nurturing the cluster with human capital of excellence and in allowing the faculty members to commercially exploit their skills and technical know how. The most interesting result of this part of the analysis is that the regions under scrutiny owe their virtuous process of competitiveness recovery to three sets of factors, each originating from one of the three territorial actors making up a regional innovation system – firms, institutions, university – so that behind each regional renewal history it is possible to recognize the presence and the ‘functioning’ of a RIS. 3. A taxonomy of regional transformation paths: Next, we classified the development dynamics of the regions investigated above along three paths of economic restructuring. The first path, here defined as the RIS into process, is typical of industrial clusters in engineering-based sectors such as plant engineering, specialised advanced machinery and shipbuilding. Here the relationship with the RIS is developed at a later stage of the cluster life, as the RIS originates in response to the presence of the cluster. This is the case of a number of regions under scrutiny (Baden-Württemberg and Brabant, for instance) where the regional innovation system was specifically designed to support and strengthen local existing industrial specializations. The second regional development path, typical of industrial clustering in science-based sectors such as genetics, IT and biotechnology, follows the opposite ‘direction’. Here the RIS is the main source of the cluster creation and the cluster develops from the regional innovation system by exploiting all the local resources in terms of cooperation and interaction with universities and local institutions. This is the case of regions such as Shannon and Cambridge (UK), which have followed a transformation process here defined as RIS from process, where the pre-existence of the RIS represents a key factor for the organization of a science-based industrial system. The third path may be viewed as the result of a combination between the two different base ‘entities’ described above. In fact, in regions such as Wales, Tampere, Göteborg and North Rhine – Westphalia, science-based clusters have developed from declining engineering-based sectors, passing through the formation of a RIS. In this respect, the transformation process can be defined as RIS through process. In this group of regions, the regional innovation system acted as catalyst for the local system transformation process, driving the regional competitive repositioning through the development of clusters of innovative and high tech firms. In this respect, the process of territorial transformation has taken place thanks to a ‘systemic effort’ and as a result of social interdependencies among territorial actors. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p743&r=geo |
| By: | Hale Ciraci; Kenan Gocer; Ebru Kerimoglu |
| Abstract: | Tourism industry has been used to create new employment opportunities by increasing the business capacity and to provide economic growth in Turkey. But most of the tourism investments have been located in relatively more developed western and southern regions, which are ecologically sensitive coastal areas. It is known that there are important disparities between socio-economic development levels of different regions and tourism industry can be a planning investment in revitalizing the less developed areas. Turkey is a very large country, it has very much climatic regions and natural resources and as it is a place of meeting of many cultures and religions throughout the history, it owns a very rich cultural and archaeological inheritance. In this framework, it is possible to make tourism investments in such fields as urban tourism, sea-sun tourism, winter tourism or religion based tourism. The urban tourism that is able to attract tourists in any season has a very widespread potential in the country and provides us with substantial opportunities for the provinces with only one tourism option such as winter tourism. From 1980s so far, there has been discrete developments thanks to efforts of local governments, the association of tourism investors and the Ministry of Tourism. The Law for Tourism Encouragement enforced in 1982 defined the terms ‘tourism region’, ‘tourism area’ or ‘tourism center’ and provided such concepts with a legal definition and determined the systems of encouragement and means of application in these fields. In establishing these regions, areas and centers, the country has been taken as a whole with its natural, historical, archaeological, socio-cultural and tourism values as well as winter, hunting and water sports, health tourism and religion based tourism potential. But a means to create network by combining different types of tourism and creating a synergy in tourism sector by means of cooperation between the cities has not been followed so far. Combining these different types of tourism and providing cooperation between cities will create a synergy in tourism sector in less developed areas. This study tries to answer the question of which cities can be grouped as a network to cooperate based on tourism industry regarding their tourism potential. In this study using cluster analysis and factor analysis cities are grouped according to their socio-economic development levels. The results of cluster analysis indicate that western-southern, middle-northern, and eastern-southern regions are three major development levels. According to the factor analysis, the provinces grouped in 4 different levels of development in relation to different factors. These spatial settings in Turkey’s geography show as to which regions would respond the investments to be made in a shorter period. As the country is very large, the attractive points with a high tourism potential, other than those in the developed regions should be determined and a synergy between the settlement zones should be established in an effort to increase the productivity. It would be possible to coordinate the infrastructure investments to take place in the cities and to define the short, medium and long-term investments with this study. |
| Date: | 2004–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa04p409&r=geo |
| By: | Dimitris Kallioras; George Petrakos; Georgios Fotopoulos |
| Abstract: | The European economic landscape has changed dramatically during the last decade, following the collapse of the bi-polar world. The parallel and interacting processes of economic integration and transition are the driving forces of these changes. In this context, the EU new member-states (including the candidate countries of Bulgaria and Romania) have experienced, often forcefully and painfully, the impact of these processes as a pre-condition for catch-up and integration with the prosperous EU-15 countries. Being still in progress, these processes have altered the intraregional division of labor, affecting the patterns of regional specialization and industrial concentration and increasing the level of interregional competition and inequalities, in a newly emerged internationalized environment. The extent and the impact of these changes, however, are still issues of major scientific dialogue and concern, with many unknown parameters. The need for this first period of transition and economic integration (decade of 90s) to be re-evaluated is evident concerning the mobility of economic activities and possible re-location of industries, the behaviour of the individual regions, the dynamics of regional discrepancies and the stability of the territorial structures. The overall scientific objective of this paper is to identify and explain in a cross-country and comparative analysis the structural industrial patterns in the area of EU new member-states bringing together the findings and reports of the scientific bibliography. Furthermore, a static and dynamic analysis takes place in order to uncover in more depth the possible relation between economic integration, regional structural change and cohesion in these countries. To this direction, a number of research questions are addressed: What is the impact of economic integration to the evolution of regional industrial patterns? Have advanced and lagging-behind regions developed similar or different types of specialization? What is their mix of activities? Over time, do they become more similar or dissimilar? Have metropolitan regions the same mix of activities with peripheral and border regions? Do their economic structures become more similar or dissimilar over time? Are there particular types of structural change more closely related to strong growth performance? The main part of the analysis is conducted on a basis of employment data, as a proxy for industrial structures in NUTS III spatial level, disaggregated by manufacturing branches according to NACE rev.1 two-digit classification. Emphasis is given to the countries of Bulgaria, Romania, Slovenia, Hungary and Estonia due to lack of statistical information (regional-structural figures) for the other countries under research. However, despite this shortcoming, the country sample of our analysis can be considered representative of the whole area since it covers all its parts i.e. Southeastern Europe–Balkans (Bulgaria, Romania), Central Europe (Slovenia, Hungary), Eastern Europe–Baltic (Estonia). The research covers the period between 1990 and 1999, a period of extreme significance since it includes both the shocks and the upsets of the early transition (sub-period 1991–1995) and the recent, more independent, trends (1995–1999). The reported findings and conclusions of this research may be a valuable basis for the understanding of the impact of economic integration on regional structure change and cohesion and, as a result, be the basis for the discussion of the appropriate policies of cohesion in the enlarged EU-27. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p383&r=geo |
| By: | Flávio Nunes |
| Abstract: | The radical role of information and communication technology (ICT) is one of the most visible topic in the media today and seems to grow from day to day, as well as telecommunications are gradually becoming the central infrastructure tying together our society. The advent of these technologies during the past decades, and their widespread use, is radically transforming the dynamics of communication and our understanding of spatial relationships (by the reduce of distances and the increase of accessibility to information and new services). If there are many studies, attempting to show how city management and regional development policies can creatively address the complex linkages between ICT and urban and regional prosperity (influencing the objective of increasing urban living conditions, combating inwardness, promoting employment and economic competitiveness and supporting social integration policies), there are also many authors arguing that electronic communications reinforce existing patterns of physical communication rather than create new patterns. These suppositions are usually theoretical discussions, that needs to be rigorously tested with empirical analysis and comparative perspectives. The main objective of this paper is precisely to present a detailed study about Portugal, with the purpose of questioning the decrease of spatial disparities due to the potential influence of ICT’s. This research is mostly based on new spatial statistics, collected, mapped and analysed in order to understand the diffusion process of the most sophisticated, diverse and capable telecommunication infrastructures, and consequently verify the plasticity of space throughout Portugal, and the ways it has been stretched or compressed. We will be focusing the globally-interconnected set of computer networks, known as ‘The Internet’, which is widely used by millions of individuals, firms and institutions every day, as a way to get into an invisible domain, popularly known as cyberspace, in order to seek information, marketing new services and products, and as means of communication within and between organizations. We believe that this invisible territories of the cyberspace do have a geography and, in an attempt to reveal its topography, we should analyse the spatial patterns of the ownership of Internet space. Despite the rapid growth of Internet in recent years, and the gradually recognition of its implications, there is a lack of knowledge about its geographic diffusion and its attendant implication for regional urban development. Specially in what concerns to its effective role to generate substantial adjustments on traditional portuguese regional dichotomies, or instead, if it is an unexpected contribute to reinforce territorial disintegration tendencies. For the empirical research will try to find links between cyberspace and the portuguese physical geography. In our opinion a good way to achieve this goal is discovering which and where are located the portuguese entities that recognize the importance to distribute globally information, about their activities and services, through the use of the Internet. For that we will explore the compulsory registration of all .pt domain names on one single institution –Foundation for National Scientific Computing- (FNSC), which performs all the registration services for the geographical .pt domain. |
| Date: | 2004–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa04p513&r=geo |
| By: | Anne Aguilera |
| Abstract: | The continuous increase in the average commuting distance that characterizes European and North-American metropolitan areas is mainly the consequence of two developments. On one hand, the number of people living in a metropolitan area but working in another is on the increase. On the other hand, people living and working within the same metropolitan area are increasingly living further and further from their place of work: the 1999 and 1990 French censuses emphasize that the average (intra-metropolitan) distance from home to work has grown by 16% over the last decade. In particular, the municipality of residence is becoming increasingly different from the municipality of work. Such changes in commuting patterns, especially in the development of inter-municipality commutes, are promoting increased regular car use. These findings explain the growing interest in the relationship between urban form and commuting patterns. Given that most metropolitan areas are becoming polycentric, a body of research investigates whether polycentric distribution of people and jobs would be likely to re-organize mobility patterns in a more sustainable way. A key question is whether the development of employment subcenters would be likely to favor the co-location of workers and jobs in the suburbs and then to counteract increasing home-to-work distances. Most polycentric urban models are indeed based on the premise that people tend to locate within or close to their employment subcenter. But empirical studies tend to be more contradictory. In France, although many recent studies have underlined the development of subcenters inside most metropolitan areas and especially the biggest, links between polycentrism and commuting patterns have not been widely discussed. Urban sprawl in general is felt to be responsible for the growth of the average commuting distance insofar as the further the people live from the central city, the longer they spend commuting. But the specific impact of polycentrism and in particular the co-location hypothesis, i.e. the place of residence of those working in a subcenter, have not been questioned. In this paper two specific questions are raised. Are the people who live in a subcenter also employed in this subcenter? And do the (other) people working in a subcenter live close to this subcenter? If we compare the answers to these two questions in 1990 and in 1999, we can assess whether the situation is better or worse (in terms of proximity to place of work) in 1999 than ten years previously. The empirical work focuses on Paris which is the largest French metropolitan areas. Our findings emphasize that, although there are more jobs than working residents in all the subcenters, most people living in a subcenter work outside their subcenter of residence. This situation was also more marked by 1999 than it previously was in 1990. As a result, average commuting distances have increased for people living in a subcenter. In addition to this, the majority of jobs located in subcenters are filled by non-residents who generally live quite far from their employment subcenter, and indeed further in 1999 than they did in 1990. In conclusion we suggest some guidelines for future research. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p255&r=geo |
| By: | Philippe De Vreyer; Sandrine Mesplé-Somps; Gilles Spielvogel |
| Abstract: | Economic growth certainly is not a uniform process over space, especially in a country as vast and diverse as Brazil. Among the determinants of local growth, the role of externalities has been much discussed in the recent literature (Glaeser et al., 1992). These externalities not only matter for growth within a given city or region but also for growth in neighbouring localities (Lopez-Baso et al., 2004). Our paper aims at providing a causal decomposition of spatial externalities occurring in the growth process of Brazilian municipios. Local growth may impact neighbours through a variety of externalities, and understanding how these externalities operate is crucial for the elaboration of public policies. Previous works on related topics include a recent paper by Lall and Shalizi (2003). Focusing on the Brazilian Northeast, the authors find that growth in municipios is negatively influenced by growth in their neighbourhood. Clearly, it seems worthwhile to extend this kind of analysis to the whole country to try and find if this phenomenon is a Northeastern specificity or a nationally valid result. Moreover, providing a more detailed account of the role of various sources of spatial externalities, and of their potential heterogeneities between regions, would be valuable. Spatial externalities Why may growth at a location affect growth at a neighbouring location? Several causes can be invoked. First, through technological externalities, a locality may benefit from improved economic conditions in another. For instance, if some firms in a locality have developed innovative processes, knowledge spillovers may favour the diffusion of new technologies to firms at neighbouring locations. Linkages between input suppliers and final producers may also be critical: if a final consumption good produced at a particular location benefits from a booming demand, upstream firms in the same region will thrive. Finally, proximity of an important economic centre may improve matching on the labour market, thus reducing costs and increasing labour productivity. Pecuniary externalities may also matter in spatial growth differentials: growth at a location may attract new firms and workers, thus increasing land rents. Transmission of this land market tension to nearby localities can reduce incentives for firms to locate there, and therefore attenuate growth prospects. Finally, local economic growth may foster immigration from less dynamic places. The impact of this migration on both the departure and arrival locations depends on various factors, notably the differences in education levels between the two localities, the substitutability between skilled and unskilled workers in production and the state of local labour markets. Empirical strategy: In order to disentangle which channels matter the most among the various kind of externalities, and to evaluate their spatial scope, we focus on the most rapidly growing Brazilian municipios. From a qualitative point of view, selecting a sample of fast growing localities permits to have a better understanding of the local growth process, since part of these localities are “polar cases” owing their rapid growth to a restricted combination of factors. Moreover, the strength of spatial externalities is likely to be greater in these locations.We evaluate the effects of these externalities on the performance of neighbouring municipios using spatial econometrics methods (Anselin, 2003), and controlling for various local characteristics of the neighbourhood (economic specializations, education, density, public infrastructures, etc.). Using different neighbours’ sets permits to measure the geographical scope of these externalities: some types of externalities only operate at short distance, while others may impact more distant locations. (Neighbours’ sets can be geographically defined, but also sets designed following other similarity or complementarity criterions.) Policy implications: poverty traps and land market issues Understanding how local growth may spread to neighbours or may hinder their economic performance is critical for policy design. Many Brazilian regions are characterized by important spatial inequalities between municipios, which seem to be very persistent over time. These poverty traps result from disparities in growth among neighbours and reducing them requires a better understanding of their formation. Moreover, local policies aiming at fostering growth may have adverse effects on nearby localities, certainly not a desirable outcome. Knowing which are the “bad” channels may help designing more efficient policies. Land and transportation policies are also a closely related issue: some spatial externalities are driven by the functioning of the land market. When rising rents in a growing locality are transmitted to adjacent locations, for instance, public policies may be needed to reduce market tensions through the development of new land plots or the improvement of transportation networks. In this case again, evaluating the strength and spatial scope of pecuniary externalities can help improving these policies. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p573&r=geo |
| By: | Alejandro Diaz-Bautista (COLEF) |
| Abstract: | The present study of regional economic growth in Mexico is based on the new economic geography, where distance plays an important role in explaining urban regional economic growth. The results show that distance to the northern border of Mexico and labor migration between states of Mexico, after the passage of NAFTA are important factors that explain the regional state growth and agglomerations in Mexico between 1994 and 2000. The results also indicate that job growth and FDI are not significant for the period of study. Resumen. El presente estudio sobre el crecimiento económico regional en México se basa en la nueva geografía económica, donde la distancia juega un papel importante para explicar el crecimiento económico urbano regional. Los resultados muestran que la distancia a la frontera norte de México y la migración en México, después de la puesta en marcha del TLCAN, son factores importantes que explican el crecimiento regional estatal y las aglomeraciones para el periodo 1994 a 2000. Los resultados también indican que el crecimiento del numero de empleos por sector y la Inversión Extranjera directa no son significativos para el periodo de estudio. |
| Keywords: | Economic Growth, FDI, Agglomerations, Regional Convergence, Mexico. |
| JEL: | C3 O40 R00 |
| Date: | 2005–08–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wpa:wuwpur:0508001&r=geo |
| By: | Alexander Granberg; Alexander Pelyasov |
| Abstract: | One of unexpected results of the economic reform in Russia was the rebirth of interest for regional programs and schemes as documents of strategic planning. Regional and municipal authorities, scientific community (not only Keynesian-like, but liberal economist Friedman-style as well), big and small business community, and civil society structures, now emerging in the Russian regions, all demonstrate their interest towards regional programs and schemes. Of course these documents are not of directive character now. They are of coordinative, partnership nature, oriented to consolidate efforts and resources of the state, business, citizens for modernization of the regional economy and increase of the GRP. Their ideology is based not only on principles of Soviet economists under the Gosplan era but on the achievements of institutional theory, theory of regional markets and the experience of regional policy in the European Union. However, in spite of new methodology of contemporary Russian regional programs and schemes, they neglect post-industrial challenges ahead of the country, in their concrete projects. For instance, cluster of federal programs of regional parity (“Diminishing discrepancies between Russian regions”, “Socio-economic development of Kaliningrad; the Kurils Islands; Far-Eastern regions; Southern republics in the European Russia”), in contrast with cluster of federal programs on the new economy, deals only with current social problems. These defects of contemporary federal and regional programs of socio-economic development can be seen precisely in the federal Program “Diminishing discrepancies between Russian regions intil 2015” approved by federal government in 2001. In this document possibilities to decrease striking contrasts between leaders and outsiders are connected with state financed projects of social and communal infrastructure in the 40 oblasts, republics and okrugs, whose level of social and economic development is beyond the average. Same problems in the EU regions are solved by projects directed to increase the quality of human resources. They are proved to be very efficient. During the last years Council for Research for Productive Forces (CRPF) has been eleborated four programs of socio-economic development: for Republic of Komi, Kemerovo and Jewish Oblasts, Khanty-Mansi autonomous Okrug. These documents are not comprehensive in contrast with their Soviet predecessors. They deal with numbered list of problems. They admit that regional development is multi-actors process. Structures of regional authorities, business, civil society participate in the projects under the Program. Many program measures are oriented to provide balance of interest for economic agents. Special attention is devoted to improve regional norms and rules of economic behaviour for economic actors in the new section titled “Development of the regional normative base”. CRPF is working under schemes of development and allocation of productive forces for Khanty-mansy autonomous Okrug and Chechen Republic. In comparison with programs schemes are more long-term documents of territorial planning. Also they include different variants of future development for every municipality. Experience of several federative states in the European Union meeting the challenge of striking inter-regional contrasts proves the necessity to elaborate new federal program “Innovative region” for the Russian Federation. It can be seen as analogue of the German program “Innoregio”. This new program should affirm new perception of creative region (now dominating perception in the federal programs is about region as the location of social problems), stimulate build-up of regional innovative systems, development of post-industrial activities. Russian programs and schemes as tools of regional policy which in the Soviet era were so distinct from Europeans by their directive ideology, central role of the state, slowly but straightforwardly are synchronizing with their analogues in the EU by their goals, tasks, and mechanisms. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p101&r=geo |
| By: | André De Palma; Kiarash Motamedi; Nathalie Picard; Dany Nguyen Luong |
| Abstract: | There is a new growing interest in the development and in the use of integrated land use and transport planning models in France. In this paper, we describe the steps of a current project which aims to integrate UrbanSim, a flexible land use model, and METROPOLIS, a dynamic traffic model, and to apply this integrated model to Paris region. We shortly present the two models and the common architecture then we describe the fastidious but crucial step of collecting input data and calibration data for the study area. Paris region is one of the most important metropolises in the world: 12,000 km2, 11 millions inhabitants and 5 millions jobs. Most interactions between the land use dynamics and the transportation dynamics are taken into account in the short, middle and long term. All of this consists in a pioneering and innovative work, for a region where urban planning and fiscal policies are very important. UrbanSim is a land use model developed at the University of Washington (USA). It is based mainly on three logit models (households and jobs localization choices and development type choice models) and a hedonic regression model (land price model). The data structure is based on a large grid which partitions the whole Paris region with 50 000 square cells by 500 meters. This high level of spatial resolution is really original in France but requires a huge amount of data and spatial analysis that we have performed thanks to the GIS tool. METROPOLIS is a dynamic transportation model developed at the University of Cergy-Pontoise (FRANCE). It provides the user surplus as the measure of accessibility. This measure takes into account the time-dependent congestion situation of the transportation system. On the other hand METROPOLIS can differentiate the users by their value of time and desired arrival time and some other behavioral parameters. The roads network contains more than 16,000 links, the transit network contains about 4,000 links. An architecture bas been designed to integrate these two models within a coherent framework. A prototype of interface has been developed which allows input and output data to be exchanged in an automatic feedback process. We use different sources to build the input database: general census, numerical land use database (cover of 400,000 parcels classified into 83 different types), regional travel survey, the notary database of real-estate transactions, local land use plans, commercial and offices surfaces data, income tax files, … Since none of these sources is perfect, we had to develop innovative methods to realize data fusion and mixed databases. For example, we localize the 11,000 households of the travel survey in the grid, or we associate the attribute of income from the tax files to the attributes of household in the general census. The second database concerns the calibration data. For each of the four models of UrbanSim, we have developed a significant sample of individual observations from four sources: the general census, the travel survey, the land use evolution database and the notary database of real-estate transactions. These files will be used to estimate the models thanks to an econometric software. We choose as period of calibration 1990 – 1999. We plan to achieve our project in the end of 2005. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p421&r=geo |
| By: | Olivier Crevoisier; Frédéric Quiquerez |
| Abstract: | The aim of this paper is to integrate control relations in the analysis of regional production systems (RPSs). Financial economy aspects are often neglected in the analysis of classical and also regional economists. However, many studies show that this financial dimension is far from neutral and that it has a considerable impact on the real economy.During the twenty last years, Swiss regions have grown according to different rhythms, compromising the convergence process of per capita incomes. The approach in terms of RPSs used by Crevoisier, Corpataux and Thierstein (2001) explains a considerable part of these different evolutions. For the authors, the Swiss economy is made up of eleven RPSs strongly specialised in activities like chemistry, textile, microtechnic, tourism, administration and finance. The RPSs specialised in traditional activities have had poor performances while the financial systems has grown rapidly. The result of these different trajectories is a clear dualisation of the Swiss economy (Corpataux and Crevoisier, 2001). The RPS approach is mainly focused on endogenous phenomenons and considers that competitiveness of regions can be explained by the history of interactions between the actors and the institutions of the RPSs. In this paper, we propose to complete this approach by measuring the level of decision-making autonomy. In respect with the theory of spatial division of labour, the idea is to take into account the existence of multilocation firms or of groups, implying a distribution of the firm functions, but also a concentration of the strategic decisional power. In addition to that, we integrate another crucial aspect for the Swiss case, that is the fiscal federalism. In the opinion of Maillat and Quiquerez (2003), the fiscal competition explains a great part of the evolution of disparities. The great differences between regions’ taxing rates clearly influences firm behaviour. Our main hypothesis is that the allocation of strategic establishments is not homogenous and that these headquarters are located in the RPS specialised in financial activities, reminiscent of what Sassen (1991) describes. But this situation is mitigated by the communities’ fiscal competition. To show that, we use data on participations and on property of establishments. The aim is to measure the intensity of cross-regional relations and also to evaluate the autonomy degree of each RPSs. Results show that there are significant disparities in terms of control. Some regions are highly dependent of other: an important share of their economy is controlled by firms located in other regions. Financial centres are at the top of this hierarchy. Beside this domination, few cantons succeed in using the fiscal tool. The spatial division of labour approach and these results about control relations in RPSs complete the analysis done considering the Swiss regions specialisations. More than that, it reinforces the idea of a dualisation of the Swiss economy. Indeed, authors like Zimmerman (1995) and Dupuy and Gilly (1995) agree to say that the embededdness (anchorage) of non autonomous firms is precarious compared to independent SMEs. Concentration of strategic jobs, with highest wages, is a factor of regional divergence. This factor is reinforced by the weak embededdness (anchorage) of the secondary units, poorly implicated in the regional economic circuit and at risk of being partially or completely relocated. Moreover, and that will be the hypothesis for our next research, we think that possessions and subsidiaries finance the headquarters, breaking out the local accumulation networks. This situation may distort the competition between regions. Bibliography CORPATAUX J. et CREVOISIER O., 2001, « Place financière ou économie de production ? Les mécanismes de la dualisation économique et spatiale de la Suisse (1975-2000) », Géographie, Economie, Société, vol. 3, n°1, pp. 3-30. CREVOISIER O., CORPATAUX J. et THIERSTEIN A., 2001, Intégration monétaire et régions : des gagnants et des perdants, Paris, L’Harmattan. Dupuy C. et Gilly J.-P., 1995, « Les stratégies territoriales des grands groupes », in Rallet A. et Torre A. (éd.), Economie industrielle et économie spatiale, Economica, Paris. Maillat D. et Quiquerez F., 2003, « L’évolution des disparités régionales en Suisse », Contribution au XXXIXème colloque de l’ASRDLF : concentration et ségrégation, dynamiques et inscriptions territoriales, Lyon, 1-3 septembre. Sassen S., 1991, The global City : New York, London, Tokyo, Princeton University Press, Princeton. Zimmermann J.B., 1995, « Dynamiques industrielles: le paradoxe du local », in Rallet A. et Torre A. (éd.), Economie industrielle et économie spatiale, Economica, Paris. |
| Date: | 2004–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa04p419&r=geo |
| By: | Shihe Fu |
| Abstract: | Existing studies have explored either only one or two of the mechanisms that human capital externalities percolate at only macrogeographic levels. This paper uses the 1990 Massachusetts Census data and tests four mechanisms at the microgeographic levels in the Boston metropolitan area labor market. We propose that individual workers can learn from their occupational and industrial peers in the same local labor market through four channels: depth of human capital stock, Marshallian labor market externalities, Jacobs labor market externalities, and thickness of the local labor market. We find that all types of human capital externalities are significant across Census blocks. Different types of externalities attenuate at different speeds over distances. For example, the effect of human capital depth decays rapidly beyond three miles away from block centroid. We conclude that knowledge spillovers are very localized within microgeographic scope in cities that we call Smart Café Cities. |
| Keywords: | Human capital externalities, Labor market agglomeration, Hedonic wage model, Marshallian externalities, Jacobs externalities, Spatial attenation |
| JEL: | C21 J24 J31 R23 |
| Date: | 2005–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cen:wpaper:05-24&r=geo |
| By: | Roger Vickerman; Alan Hay; Kate Meredith |
| Abstract: | The regional impact of transport infrastructure investment has achieved considerable attention across Europe in recent years. The construction of major bridges and tunnels to overcome natural barriers and the development of the trans-European networks has led to large volumes of research on the likely economic impacts of such investment on neighbouring regions. Most of these studies are ex ante studies undertaken as part of the decision process into the investment, either on the part of the project promoter or the affected regions. At the same time there has been a continuation of interest in the broader question of the wider economic benefits arising from transport improvements at a more aggregate level; whether and under what circumstances such benefits do arise, and if so how they can be incorporated in any evaluation. As a recent study by Flyvbjerg et al (2003) has shown, the claims made for the returns on major projects have tended to be exaggerated, both in terms of underestimates of likely costs and overestimates of potential direct traffic benefits. This paper provides a relatively rare example of an ex post study of what impacts one of the major recent infrastructure projects has had on the local and regional economy by looking at the experience of the Channel Tunnel after its first ten years of operation. The paper reviews the methodological issues in carrying out an ex post study and assembles evidence related to traffic, labour market, investment and development impacts compared to the ex ante expectations. The main methodological issue is in establishing the counter-factual position of how the regional economy would have developed in the absence of the tunnel. A substantial volume of traffic would have continued to have passed through the region’s ports using the ferries which would have required continuing investment over this period. This has been a period also in which major changes have occurred in the EU economy with the move to completion of a Single Market. Many of the driving forces of the regional economy come from the adjacent London metropolitan region. The approach adopted has been to examine trends in the regional economy relative to those in the wider regional and national economies in both the UK and France. There are two basic questions: to what extent would traffic have continued to grow at the rate experienced in the absence of the tunnel infrastructure; and has tunnel related traffic had a differential impact on the local economy from a similar volume of ferry traffic? The paper examines in detail the volume and structure of traffic and compares these with ex ante traffic forecasts; trends in the local labour markets in terms of the growth of job opportunities, occupational structure and the evolution of unemployment; investment (including foreign investment) in the regional economy; and the development and execution of plans for physical development in the region. The paper concludes that although much has changed in the region following the completion of the tunnel, it is difficult to identify a significant difference in the aggregate performance relative to the wider regional and national experiences. Essentially, the improvement of transport infrastructure has enabled the regions to be more integrated into their wider regions and experience a similar economic performance, but whether this has led to a better performance is more difficult to determine. |
| Date: | 2004–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa04p570&r=geo |
| By: | Erik Stam |
| Abstract: | There is an emerging interest in the local conditions of entrepreneurship and firm dynamics. The often-cited examples of entrepreneurship in successful regional clusters show that entrepreneurship is really a localized phenomenon, which seems to be at odds with the increased globalization of economic activity, in which firms are said to be relatively footloose and easily become multinational enterprises. Other authors have noted that in spite of information and communication technologies, the vital importance of face-to-face contact cannot be discounted (Hallowell, 1999); as Leamer and Storper (2001: 641) observe, the Internet “allows long distance ‘conversations’ but not ‘handshakes’ ”. Next to controversies concerning the role of the global and the local for firms (cf. West, 2002), there is a general weakness in the theory of the firm concerning the analysis of (new) firm dynamics. According to Geroski (2001) the theory of the firm in economics is preoccupied by the question of why firms exist, and it is both very narrow and very static. Further work in this area might be usefully extended to address the question of how firms grow and develop over time, and this, in turn, will force people to think through issues associated with what makes change difficult for firms. We will deal with these issues in a discussion of evolutionary theories of the firm in general, and specific theories of the entrepreneurial firm and the multinational firm in particular, and regional cluster approaches. The central question in this paper is: “Are there necessary interactions between the development of entrepreneurial firms and their spatial organization over time?”. We will deal with this question in a longitudinal way, i.e. analyze the development of entrepreneurial firms and the changes in their spatial organization during their life course. The development of entrepreneurial firms involves the firm–founding (Shane and Khurana, 2003) and the subsequent early growth (Garnsey, 1998) of the firm. These firms are not self-employed (anymore), and mostly not (yet) a multinational corporation; in a sense they are neither small nor large, but dynamic, turning from a caterpillar into a butterfly (cf. Penrose 1995), and are central to dynamics in the new, or entrepreneurial economy (Bresnahan et al., 2001; Audretsch and Thurik, 2003). The empirical part of this study is based on comparative case studies (Eisenhardt, 1989; Yin, 2003) of 25 entrepreneurial firms, and 8 micro firms in four propulsive industries, namely professional business services, biomedicals, graphics-media, and shipbuilding. The spatial organization of firms consists of the dynamic constructs of locational adjustment and locational flexibility, which refer to the adjustment of the spatial organization of firms outside the headquarter (the location at which the entrepreneur/owner-manager executes his activities) of the firm and to the flexibility of the location of the headquarter respectively. With these two dimensions the tendency towards concentration or dispersion of the firm can be observed (cf. Storper, 1997, p.299-300). The spatial development of new firms consists of the sequence of locational events. Locational events refer to the changes in the state of the spatial organization of firms. The different types of locational events were coded in order to find typical sequences of locational events (cf. Abbott, 1995). Concrete events have been studied that may be unique to some extent. However, “[t]he focus is not on how or why something happened but on how or why something happens” (Mohr, 1982, p.5). We are looking for mechanisms that explain the spatial development of new firms. The abstract knowledge resulting from insight into these mechanisms may be more generally applicable. We have used a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods. We registered the general characteristics of the entrepreneur, his network relations, the firm (its strategy, structure and capabilities), inter-organizational relations, and their locations. The qualitative method involved a life history of the firm as told by the entrepreneur (Van Geenhuizen et al., 1992). This life history has been explicated with a critical incident technique (Tjosvold and Weicker, 1993; Chell and Pittaway, 1998). The fieldwork involved the study of how (location) decisions are actually made during the life course of emerging firms and how they affect and are affected by the firms’ development in general. Next to the quantitative data derived from the interviews other data from company archives, the press and other media was collected. The empirical study shows that capabilities more often seem to constrain (as a place-specific sunk cost) than to enable the spatial flexibility of entrepreneurial firms. However, certain organizational capabilities have to be built in order to become multilocational, especially on the interregional and international levels. The inter-organizational networks in regional clusters are hardly relevant in the explanation of the dynamics in the spatial organization of entrepreneurial firms. They only seem to constrain the location behavior in the early phases of entrepreneurial firms, when radical changes in the spatial organization are almost never considered at all. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p449&r=geo |
| By: | Michael Sable |
| Abstract: | The nature of economic development in advanced and developing economies alike has changed dramatically during the last generation as high-technology/knowledge-intensive industries have had a profound impact upon the way that people work and live. As The Economist has noted: “America gets more than half its economic growth from industries that barely existed a decade ago—such is the power of innovation, especially in the information and biotechnology industries.” The first phase of this revolution stemmed from the dramatic impact of information technologies such as the personal computer, software, the Internet, and now wireless communications. During the 1990s, an unprecedented stock market boom in the United States was driven by investment in these technologies. India, a country as poverty-stricken as any, has become an economic power because of its ability to effectively participate in the global information technology value chain. However, at present, the most important and the fastest growing segment of this emergent knowledge economy is biotechnology. While scientific knowledge as a whole has been doubling every ten years, it has been doubling every five years in the field of biology. The result has been a technological renaissance in biotechnology-related fields ranging from bioinformatics to biopharmaceuticals. This biotechnology-driven renaissance is reflected in the dramatic race to map the human genome and in the many new drugs that are influencing mankind’s quality of life. The astounding rate of growth in this industry and a general desire to partake of its lucrative economic bounty has led national and regional governments to focus on the development of biotechnology clusters as a catalyst for regional economic development. Indeed, a survey of 77 local and 36 state economic development agencies in the U.S. reported that 83% have listed biotechnology as one of their top two targets for industrial development. For example, St. Louis, Missouri has sought to become a player in the field of agricultural biotechnology by creating a biotech cluster in the heart of its long-neglected inner-city. Outside the United States, Singapore has launched Biopolis, an 18.5 hectare, $300 million science park devoted exclusively to biomedical research and development; while neighboring Malaysia is doing the same with its BioValley Initiative. Thus, this keen focus on biotechnology is increasingly reshaping the physical environment of cities—both poor and rich—as they seek to become players in a lucrative industry of the future. Recently, continental Europe has also made a bid to become a dynamic player in the biotechnology industry as evidenced by the BioPartner Initiative of the Netherlands. How is this industry affecting the urban milieu? What is the impact of a particular high-technology industry—biotechnology--on regional economic development? Why have some areas been more successful than others in cultivating and developing biotechnology clusters? This paper will examine the evolution of the Dutch biopharmaceutical industry and its impact on regional economic development (real estate and labor markets) in the Randstad. Hypothesis: This dissertation is an examination of the consequences vis a vis regional economic development of biopharmaceutical clusters in the Randstad region of the Netherlands. These clusters are at different stages of evolution in respect to more advanced areas such as the United States and the UK; and are affected by a distinct policy environment. The clusters to be analyzed are situated in the polynuclear area of the Netherlands’ Randstad. The historical dynamics of the biotechnology industry as well as the specific costs and benefits that it imposes upon the labor and real estate markets in this area will be assessed. The central hypotheses of this study is that the unique characteristics of the biotechnology industry is leading to gentrification (real estate impact); and that the biotechnology industry promotes bifurcation in the urban labor market as it enhances job growth amongst the highly skilled but is not a significant source of employment for the low and semi-skilled. The aforementioned gentrification hypothesis is built upon the anchor tenant hypothesis posited by Prof. Maryann Feldman in “The Locational Dynamics of the U.S. Biotech Industry: Knowledge Externalities and the Anchor Hypothesis.” Therein Dr. Feldman argues that an anchor tenant’s brand recognition creates an externality for smaller stores who realize greater sales volume than they would in other locations. The value of this externality is reflected in higher rents the average tenant pays in comparison to the rent paid by the anchor tenant. This form of price discrimination reflects a willingness of the average tenants to pay a premium for location near the anchor tenant. Universities, hospitals and other components of the biotechnology cluster have the capacity to play the role of the anchor tenant, which is having a dramatic impact on the real estate and labor markets in the areas around biotech clusters. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p266&r=geo |
| By: | Basilia Aguirre |
| Abstract: | The decentralization process in Brazilian fiscal federalism was legally launched in 1988, when the new federal constitution passed. A considerable part of main public services competencies were assigned to local governments, which are supposed to perform these tasks relying on the financial and technical support from the federation. A large share of the national tax revenues was granted to these jurisdictions, directly or by means of transferences. The higher level of local revenues were not initially translated, however, into better standards of public services, due to a lack of coordination between states and federal government, in addition to technical and administrative local level deficiencies. Over the 1990´s the institutional framework underlying Brazilian intergovernmental relations experienced important changes that seek to strength vertical coordination between municipalities and the state/national governments. A variety of new rules were gradually introduced. These rules intended mainly to establish the specific role of each government level for each kind of public service. By 2000 a whole new institutional environment were built. Health care and education programs were the main targets of these changes and it was in these areas that institutionalization of intergovernmental relations went further. Grants on these areas were constitutionally established by constitutional amendments. And, enforcement rules adopted. The aim was to guarantee better public services quality and access to public services. From one theoretical perspective these changes should improve public services by introducing new monitoring mechanisms. From another these changes limit local governments autonomy and hinder local governments capacity to develop policies suitable to local conditions. The arguments in favor of each position are not conclusive and the dilemma is long known in fiscal federalism literature. The question to be addressed by this paper concerns the relation between the centralization trend of Brazilian fiscal federalism structure as represented by the changes pointed above and the potential for diminishing regional disparities. The hypothesis to be tested is that the greater control by federation over the delivery of local public services may improve public services quality as a whole but does not necessarily favours the convergence on living conditions between regions. To do that it will be identified local expenditure patterns in 1990 and 1999 with special emphasis in health and education and related the expenditure shifts to the municipalities 2000 UNO´s Human Development Index. Using municipality data for all Brazilian states it will be possible to evaluate first whether different expenditure patterns are related to the improvement on Brazilian Human Development Index for the year 2000, what will indicate that changes in fiscal federalism structure did not limited local governments to follow proper public services policies. Second it will be possible to assess if changes in fiscal federalism rules also contributed to reduce regional disparities in public service delivery as evidenced by HDI results in comparison to 1991. |
| Date: | 2004–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa04p452&r=geo |
| By: | Jeffrey Zabel; Katherine Kiel |
| Abstract: | The immobility of houses means that their location affects their values. This explains the common belief that three things determine the price of a house: location, location, and location. We use this notion to develop the 3L Approach to house price determination. That is, prices are determined by the Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA), town, and street where the house is located. This study creates a unique data set based on data from the American Housing Survey (AHS) consisting of small ‘clusters’ of housing units with information on their housing characteristics and resident characteristics that is merged with census tract-level attributes. We use this data to verify the 3L Approach: we find that all three levels of location are significant when estimating the house price hedonic equation. This indicates that individuals care about their local neighborhood, i.e. the general upkeep of their street and possibly their neighbors’ characteristics (cluster variables), a broader area such as the school district and/or the town (tract variables) that account for school quality and crime rates, and the particular amenities found in their MSA. |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cen:wpaper:04-06&r=geo |
| By: | Roger Bivand; Rolf Brunstad |
| Abstract: | The work discussed in Bivand and Brunstad (2003) was an attempt to throw light on apparent variability in regional convergence in relation to agriculture as a sector subject to powerful political measures, in Western Europe, 1989 1999. We tried to explore the possibility that some of the observed specification issues in current results are rooted in neglecting agricultural policy interventions, within the limitations imposed by data available. We also attempted to use this as a case setting for evaluating the appropriateness of geographically weighted regression (GWR) as a technique for assessing coef- ficient variability, over and above for instance country dummies, but possibly reflecting missing variables or other specification problems. The present study takes up a number of points made in conclusion in that paper. Since it is possible that the non-stationarity found there is related to further missing variables, including the inadequacy of the way in which agricultural subsidies are represented, we attempt to replace the agriculture variables with better estimates of producer subsidy equivalents for the base year. We also look at ways of handling changes in agricultural policy regime occurring between years and T. This raises the further challenge of looking at both spatial and temporal dimensions at the same time, which we will discuss, but are not likely to resolve satisfactorily. On the technical side, the tests on GWR estimates also need to be more firmly established. The GWR results also need to be tested for spatial autocorrelation, and re-worked in an adaptive weighting framework, although GWR does already involve a spatial weighting of the observations themselves. The paper is therefore also an account of the development of software contributed to the R project (R Development Core Team, 2004) as packages, in particular the spdep package for spatial econometrics, and the spgwr package for GWR fitting. In particular, specific issues regarding the handling of the Jacobian in fitting spatial simultaneous autoregressive (SAR) models, and in interpreting GWR output will be discussed. These will be set in the context of on-going work on semi-parametric spatial filtering, which it is hoped to add to spdep following contributions by Michael Tiefelsdorf, so that the weaknesses and strengths of alternative approaches can be compared. Concentrating on implementations in R is justified by the preliminary nature of many of these methods requiring open source and replicable statistical research approaches, so that others can, if they wish, see how results were calculated. One such technical issue is the representation of neighbours in the various approaches, and of the impact of symmetry requirements in conditional autoregressive (CAR) models typically used in MCMC estimation using Open- BUGS and elsewhere. Indeed, in many SAR models, symmetry is also required, or at least underlying symmetry, with the weights matrix in the rowstandardised weighting scheme typically being similar to a symmetric matrix. Using the Western European regional growth data augmented with agricultural policy variables, we will try to explore how far some as-yet unresolved technical questions impede progress with substantive interpretation. We will also try to show how these questions may be handled in other software settings, and how data can be moved between software platforms for analysis. In conclusion, the paper has two threads, one focussing on the analysis of the relationships between regional growth and agricultural policy, generating models needing testing, while the other attempts to meet the software demands generated in the first thread, and to incorporate on-going research in spatial data-analytic methods to respond adequately to the potential importance of the substantive research question. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p671&r=geo |
| By: | Alejandro Diaz-Bautista (COLEF) |
| Abstract: | There have been many empirical studies analyzing telecommunications clusters across countries and regions since the late eighties and nineties. Recently, much attention has been paid in the literature of cluster analysis in telecommunications. Knowledge and technology transfer matter for economic growth. Most formal analyses of knowledge driven economies have focused on the supply side: research and development and productivity. In modern high-tech economies, like telecommunications, the demand side of markets for goods are important. The paper develops a model of demand and supply for Mexico looking at a cluster formation in a regional geographical space. Concentrations in space spontaneously emerge, even when one considers quality of products, physical distance and transportation costs. These clusters arise to resolve the tension between spatial spillover externalities and the costs of adapting to new sophisticated telecommunications products. Telecommunications clusters in Mexico affect competition in three broad ways: first, by increasing the productivity of companies based in a region; by driving the direction and pace of innovation in telecommunications, which underpins future productivity growth; and by stimulating the formation of new business communications technology, which expands and strengthens the cluster itself. I describe most of the largest cable/satellite TV and related telecommunications clusters in Mexico. Sumario: Se han tenido diversos estudios empíricos en los ochentas y noventas que tratan de comprobar la teoría de los clusters o concentración de empresas interrelacionadas entre sí y concentradas en una zona geográfica concreta. De igual manera se han realizado estudios empíricos de cómo estos clusters pueden traer beneficios económicos a las empresas de telecomunicaciones. Los clusters aumentan la productividad de las empresas de telecomunicaciones, que es uno de los caminos para fortalecer el crecimiento económico. Al aumentar la productividad, las empresas destinan más recursos a innovación y desarrollo, crean más riqueza y siguen ganando productividad; todo ello en un marco de gran competitividad, porque, las regiones más desarrolladas son aquellas en las que existe más competencia. La implantación de una política regional en telecomunicaciones impulsará las concentraciones sectoriales de empresas en zonas geográficas concretas. Esta localización, ya se da en países industrializados como en Estados Unidos, y se empieza a dar en México, lo que ayuda a aumentar la productividad de las empresas de telecomunicaciones. El estudio desarrolla un modelo de oferta y demanda de las empresas de telecomunicaciones para poder observar la formación de clusters en las distintas áreas geográficas de México. |
| Keywords: | Clusters, Agglomerations, Telecommunications, Econometrics, TV, Mexico |
| JEL: | R |
| Date: | 2005–11–24 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wpa:wuwpur:0511013&r=geo |
| By: | Joaquim Bento de Souza Ferreira Filho; Mark Horridge |
| Abstract: | Gains and losses from trade liberalization are often unevenly distributed inside a country. For example, if budget shares vary according to household income, changes in commodity prices will redistribute an overall welfare change between household types. Household incomes will also be differentially affected. Sectoral differences in factor-intensity mean that changes in industrial structure cause redistribution of income between primary factors. Particular primary factors (such as capital, or less skilled labour) may contribute disproportionately to the incomes of certain household types. The fortunes of such households indirectly depend on the prospects of particular sectors. We emphasize these distributive issues, especially those arising from the income side. At the same time we distinguish households by regions (within the country). The regional distinction sharpens the contrast between groups of households. Particular regions have their own patterns of economic activity and so are differently affected by changes in the industrial protection structure. Since regional household incomes depend closely on value-added from local industries, economic change will tend to redistribute income between regional households. If the regional concentration of poverty is more than we could predict by regional primary factor endowments and industry structure, the addition of a regional dimension will add power to our analysis of income distribution beyond the mere addition of interesting regional detail. The paper deals with these issues more fully. We extend previous regional modeling of Brazil to include the intra-household dimension, addressing poverty and income distribution issues that may be caused by trade integration. An applied general equilibrium (AGE) inter-regional model of Brazil underlies our analysis, with a detailed specification of households. The model is static and solved with GEMPACK. The Representative Household (RH) hypothesis is abandoned; instead a micro-simulation (MS) model is used to track changes in household income and expenditure patterns. This micro-simulation model is built upon two Brazilian household studies: (1) the Household Budget Survey (POF, IBGE, 1999) covers detailed expenditure patterns for 16,013 households and 11 regions in Brazil in 1996; (2) the National Household Sample Survey (PNAD, IBGE, 1997) is a yearly survey that includes detailed information about household employment and income sources, with 331,263 observations. We integrate the two data sources to produce a detailed mapping of expenditure and income sources for 250,000 Brazilian households, distinguishing 50 activities, 80 commodities, and 27 regions. We link the AGE and MS models together, solving them iteratively to get consistency between results. After a shock the AGE model communicates changes in wages and employment by industry and labour type to the MS model that individually simulates the changes in employment, income and expenditure patterns for each household. The new expenditure pattern is then communicated to the AGE model, and the process is repeated until the two models converge. The final results from the MS model enable us to estimate changes in poverty and income distribution measures, both nationally and for regions within Brazil. We use the model to analyze poverty and income distribution impacts of the Free Trade Area of Americas formation upon the Brazilian economy. In the particular simulation we examine, freer trade leads to increased employment, especially for lower-paid workers. Poor households, which contain more enemployed adults, benefit most. This leads to a reduction in poverty in all 27 Brazilian states. |
| Date: | 2004–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa04p181&r=geo |
| By: | Alejandro Diaz-Bautista (COLEF) |
| Abstract: | In the recent growth literature, the accumulation of human capital and R&D have gained a central role. This study tries to narrow the bridge between the fields of regional convergence theory, economic growth and human capital. Unlike traditional economic growth theories, which tend to focus on exogenous comparative advantage or technological differences among regions as causes for growth, regional economic growth emphasizes the roles of increasing returns to scale in production, human capital and R&D in determining the growth of economic activities. In particular, I will consider the interaction of regional human capital and R&D economics following the recent work in economic growth and convergence. Using the recent developments in economic growth, the study centers on the regional convergence pattern in Mexico emphasizing the effects of human capital, R&D and interregional spillovers on growth. The findings suggest the existence of some human capital and bounded knowledge spillovers across regional states in Mexico. En la literatura del crecimiento, la acumulación del capital humano y la investigación y desarrollo tienen un papel central. El estudio trata de cerrar la brecha entre el campo de la convergencia, el crecimiento económico y el capital humano. A diferencia de las teorías tradicionales del crecimiento, que se centran en las ventajas comparativas y las diferencias tecnológicas entre las regiones como los determinantes del crecimiento, las nuevas teorías del crecimiento regional enfatizan el papel de los retornos crecientes a escala en la producción, el capital humano y la investigación y desarrollo para determinar el crecimiento de las actividades económicas. En particular, el estudio considera la interacción entre el capital humano y la investigación y desarrollo en el ámbito regional, siguiendo los estudios recientes en el campo del crecimiento económico y la convergencia económica. El estudio se centra en el patrón de convergencia para México, al enfatizar los efectos del capital humano, la investigación y desarrollo y las derramas interregionales en el crecimiento. Los resultados sugieren que existen derrames en el capital humano pero restricciones en la actividad de investigación y desarrollo regional para los estados de México. |
| Keywords: | Economic Growth, Mexico, Spillovers, Human Capital |
| JEL: | R |
| Date: | 2005–06–16 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wpa:wuwpur:0506012&r=geo |
| By: | Bernard L. Weinstein; Terry L. Clower |
| Abstract: | Homelessness has long been recognized as a serious problem in many American cities, and Dallas in no exception. What’s more, the homeless tend to congregate in the downtown districts (DD) since most service providers are also located in the urban core. Though homelessness is typically considered a social problem, it also has economic consequences. The latest homeless census for the city of Dallas totaled 6,000, and annual outlays by governmental, non-profit, charitable, and faith-based organizations to provide them with services probably exceed $50 million. This estimate doesn’t include thousands of volunteer hours. But the true economic cost of homelessness is much greater. A survey of downtown business owners found that the presence of homeless persons is having a negative affect on their operations and burdening many of them with additional costs for security and cleaning. A majority of retail respondents report that proximity to the homeless was scaring off customers and reducing their sales. An examination of downtown properties using Dallas County Appraisal District (DCAD) records reveals that average values in the southern sector, where most of the homeless are concentrated, are well below those in the northern half of downtown. Consequently, the City of Dallas, Dallas County, and the Dallas Independent School District are losing $2.4 million per year due to valuation disparities from a lack of development in the southern half of the DD. What’s more, we estimate the southern half of downtown can potentially support almost 2.2 million square feet of additional commercial, office and residential space. This development scenario would create more than 5,000 new jobs and generate about $6.6 million per year for local taxing entities. But the revitalization of Dallas’ DD, an avowed goal of the city’s political and business leaders, will not be fully realized until a comprehensive plan for improving homeless services is developed and implemented. Most importantly, the proposed central intake facility should be located away from—but close to—the downtown district. In this regard, the City of Miami can serve as a model. Miami has significantly reduced the visible homeless count and greatly improved the delivery of services. By creating an umbrella agency to oversee all homeless programs—whether provided by government, voluntary or faith-based institutions—the city has avoided duplication and overlap of services. Significantly, Miami has located both of its central intake facilities, known as Homeless Assistance Centers (HACs), away from their downtown district. Miami’s businesses community has recognized that reducing homelessness is a community and economic development issue as well as a social problem, and to that end they have contributed about $50 million over the past decade. The results are tangible, as evidenced by the construction boom currently underway in Miami’s downtown. As with Miami, an effective approach for dealing with Dallas’ homeless population must include greater participation and support by the region’s business leaders. Homelessness has significant economic as well as social consequences for the City of Dallas. While offering our compassion to the homeless, we should also acknowledge that the overwhelming presence of homeless persons on the streets of downtown has negative economic impacts on individual businesses, the prospects for redevelopment, and the city’s finances. |
| Date: | 2004–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa04p625&r=geo |
| By: | Ronald Jarmin; Shawn Klimek; Javier Miranda |
| Abstract: | We use the establishment level data in the Longitudinal Business Database to measure changes in market structure in the U.S. Retail Trade sector during the period, 1976 to 2000. We use firm ownership information to construct measures of firm entry and exit and also to categorize four types of retail firms: single location, and local, regional, and national chains. We use detailed location data to examine market structure in both national and county markets. We summarize the county level results into three groups: metropolitan, micropolitan, and rural. We find that retail activity is increasingly occurring at establishments owned by chain firms, especially large national chains. On average, we find that all types of retail firms are increasing in size during the period. We also find that larger markets experience more firm turnover. Finally, we see that entry and exit rates vary across two-digit retail industries. |
| Keywords: | retail trade, chain store, dynamics |
| JEL: | L11 L81 R12 |
| Date: | 2005–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cen:wpaper:05-30&r=geo |
| By: | Andrew Bernard; Stephen Redding; Peter Schott |
| Abstract: | We develop a methodology for identifying departures from relative factor price equality across regions that is valid under general assumptions about production, markets and factors. Application of this methodology to the United States reveals substantial and increasing deviations in relative skilled wages across labor markets in both 1972 and 1992 . These deviations vary systematically with labor markets’ industry structure both in cross section and over time. |
| Keywords: | Factor Price Equality, Regional Wages, Neoclassical Trade Theory, Labor Market Areas |
| JEL: | F16 J30 R23 C14 |
| Date: | 2005–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cen:wpaper:05-21&r=geo |
| By: | Johansson, Börje (CESIS - Centre of Excellence for Science and Innovation Studies, Royal Institute of Technology); Forslund, Ulla (CESIS - Centre of Excellence for Science and Innovation Studies, Royal Institute of Technology) |
| Abstract: | This paper provides an overview and critical assessment of co-location and clustering in space. Basic location conditions include accessibility to customers, input suppliers including knowledge providers, and regional endowments. A distinction is made between slow and fast location adjustments. In a basic model, it is shown how distance sensitivity and scale economies generate self-reinforcing location externalities. Variations of the same model are employed to illuminate how urbanisation economies can stimulate co-location and clustering. One model variant is designed to examine how innovation activities also can be influenced by urbanisation economies. The paper concludes that a set of basic principals form the basis for localisation and urbanisation economies. However, there remains a challenging gap between model predictions and empirical observations. |
| Keywords: | Location; co-location economies; agglomeration economies; urbanisation economies |
| JEL: | L14 L29 O30 R30 |
| Date: | 2006–05–31 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:cesisp:0067&r=geo |
| By: | Shihe Fu |
| Abstract: | Urban amenities can be capitalized into land values or property values. However, little attention has been paid to the capitalization of social amenities. This paper classifies three types of social-interaction-based social amenities: human capital, social capital, and cultural capital at residential neighborhood levels. We use the restricted version of the 1990 Massachusetts Census data and estimate hedonic housing models with social amenities. The findings are as follows: (1) Human capital has significant positive effects on property values. This tests the Lucas conjecture. (2) Different types of social capital have different effects on property values: an increase in the percentage of new residents has significant positive effects on property values, probably due to the strength of weak ties. However, an increase in the percentage of single-parent households has negative effects on property values. An increase in the home ownership rate has positive effects at large geographic levels. (3) Cultural capital effects vary from high to low geographic levels, the effects of English proficiency and racial homogeneity are positive at and beyond the tract level, but insignificant at the block level. This may imply that cultural capital is more important in social interactions at large geographic scale. |
| Keywords: | Urban amenities, capitalization, property values, human capital, social capital, cultural capital, hedonic model, social interaction |
| JEL: | A14 C21 D62 H41 R31 |
| Date: | 2005–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cen:wpaper:05-25&r=geo |
| By: | Carlos Usabiaga; María Ángeles Caraballo |
| Abstract: | In this work we centre on the menu cost models of new keynesian economics and, more concretely, on the empirical testing line proposed by Ball and Mankiw (1994, 1995), authors that confront in a monopolistic competition model the explanation of why a shock that affects relative prices also affects mean inflation. Their conclusion is that if mean inflation is near to zero the inflation-skewness relation is stronger than the inflation-variability relation, whereas in the case of a high mean inflation the inflation-variability relation is stronger. Following their approach in our analysis mean inflation is the explained variable, whereas skewness and variability of the distribution of price changes are the main explanatory variables. Our type of analysis has different applications. Firstly, in the case that we confront a relative price shock, if variability and skewness, or some of their transformations, affect inflation it means that our economy is vulnerable, so it makes especially difficult to control inflation. A second application refers to a feasible way to measure core inflation, eliminating from inflation the transitory effects introduced by skewness. Finally, this approach can contribute to test if downward price rigidity is an exogenous phenomenon or the response of optimizing agents that confront menu costs in an inflationary context. Despite these utilities, the Ball and Mankiw (1995) approximation has been rarely applied to Spanish economy.In essence, our work tries to answer whether menu costs à la Ball and Mankiw are plausible for Spanish economy, and whether exists homogeneity of the Spanish regions at this respect. The structure of the work is the following: a) exposition of the basic data and variables, the methodology followed, and the results of our first approximation to Ball and Mankiw (1995); b) consideration of alternative measures of variability and skewness; c) analysis of the role of kurtosis and introduction of two real variables (unemployment and production) as control variables; d) analysis of the causality problem; and e) after the analysis at regional level, we study whether the regions jointly present an homogeneous behavior in this area. Our period of analysis is 1994.01-2001.12. We have chosen this low inflation period because around an annual 4-5% is placed the upper limit for which the model predicts a strong inflation-skewness relation. The essential data that we use come from the series of monthly variation rate of consumer price index, disaggregated by regions and goods and services (33 subgroups), elaborated by the Instituto Nacional de Estadística (INE). In general, we observe an homogeneous behavior of the "structure" of inflation for the Spanish regions. Our analysis corroborates the results of Ball and Mankiw (1995) about the importance of the skewness of the distribution of price changes. Their results in the line that the variability coefficient is higher than the skewness coefficient, and that the estimations containing skewness present a higher coefficient of determination are also confirmed. The significance of skewness and variability at regional level shows the vulnerability of Spanish inflation in terms of relative price shocks. |
| Date: | 2004–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa04p12&r=geo |
| By: | Jean Bonnet (CREM - CNRS); Sylvie Cieply (CREM - CNRS); Marcus Dejardin (University of Namur - CREW) |
| Keywords: | Financial constraints, credit rationing, new firms, regional disparities. |
| JEL: | G20 M13 R10 |
| Date: | 2006 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tut:cremwp:200613&r=geo |
| By: | Jose Varejao; Anabela Carneiro |
| Abstract: | Understanding the evolution of earnings inequality is a major research topic with obvious policy implications. While there is widespread belief that institutions are largely responsible for the limited rise in inequality in some European countries, it is also recognised that little or no growth in inequality could be the outcome of market forces alone. However, the role of these market forces in different institutional environments is still not entirely understood. Is the small growth in inequality at the country level reflecting small increases in inequality within and between groups or is it the result of large offsetting changes in different components? Using a large longitudinal matched employer-employee dataset we produce several measures of within and between groups inequality in Portugal for the 1986-1998 period. We focus our attention on changes in the returns to observable characteristics (gender, age and education) of workers and test the hypothesis that these changes reflect developments in the labour market. However, we depart from previous research by shifting focus from the supply side to the demand side of the labour market. Drawing on the results of the by-now large literature on plant turnover we investigate the link between plant entry and exit and changing returns to observable worker characteristics. We argue that Portugal is an interesting case study because, despite very tight regulation and a centralised wage setting system, the level and changes of earnings inequality in recent years make the Portuguese case akin to the US and UK cases rather than to other European cases that share with Portugal similar labour market institutions. Furthermore, high firing costs have previously been identified as the cause for a larger share of employment adjustment occurring in Portugal through plant openings and closings as an alternative to the expansion and contraction of continuing plants. Our analysis is done at the regional level - 28 regions in mainland Portugal (NUTS III) are considered. The advantages of working at the regional level are twofold. First, data for all regions come from the same source - the Personnel Records - which eliminates all issues of comparability that plague many studies dealing with international comparisons. Second, regional comparisons within the same country guarantees a common institutional background which is appropriate given our focus on the role market forces play in shaping patterns of changing earnings inequality. Personnel Records are an administrative survey administered by the Ministry of Employment which is mandatory to all plants with at least one wage earner. Data reported by respondents include characteristics of the plant (location, industry and size), the firm they belong to (location, industry, total employment, annual sales and legal status) and each worker in the plant. Reported worker characteristics include gender, age, education, skill, tenure, earnings and weekly hours of work). Because each plant is assigned a unique invariant identifier, plants can be followed across waves and entries and exits can be identified. On average, the data contains information on 200 thousand plants and 2 million workers per year. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p709&r=geo |
| By: | Alejandro Diaz-Bautista (COLEF) |
| Abstract: | Economic growth continues to be a major objective of state governments in Mexico. What role do firm location, openness, education, and wage rates play in determining the ability of a state to increase the growth of its economy? This study examines the economic competitiveness of the Mexican states using location coefficients. This paper tries to bridge the gap between the macroeconomic issue of convergence on the aggregate income level and the microeconomic issue of labor productivity convergence on the industry and sectorial level. Resumen. El crecimiento económico continua siendo uno de los objetivos más importantes para los gobiernos estatales en México. ¿Cuál es el papel de la localización de las empresas, la apertura, la educación y los salaries en determinar la habilidad de los estados para fomentar el crecimiento de la economia? El estudio examina la competitividad de los estados en México mediante el uso de índices de localización. El estudio trata de cerrar la brecha entre el tema de la convergencia macroeconómica en el nivel agregado del ingreso y los temas microeconómicos de la convergencia de la productividad laboral a nivel sectorial e industrial. |
| Keywords: | Economic Convergence, Labor Productivity, location coefficients, Mexico |
| JEL: | L1 L6 R1 |
| Date: | 2005–12–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wpa:wuwpur:0512016&r=geo |
| By: | Patrizia Riganti; Peter Nijkamp |
| Abstract: | This paper discusses the role that cultural heritage has in shaping social capital in contemporary cities, and the available valuation methodologies capable of measuring its impacts on cities’ economic growth. First, the economic nature of cultural goods and the role played by their valuation in regional planning is discussed. Then a critical review of the current available valuation methodologies is presented. Finally, the potential of meta-analysis is debated. Cultural heritage represents the record of mankind achievements and relationships with the world. Therefore, it has always a local dimension, though sometimes it embeds universally shared values. The concept of heritage is not given, but created by a community, by people who attach values to some objects, rites, languages, contexts, lifestyles, historic sites and monumental buildings. Labelling something as heritage represents a value judgment, which distinguishes that particular object from others, adding new meaning to it. Cultural heritage summarises people’s identities, shapes communities’ ones, and to this extent contributes to the creation of social capital. Heritage is a social, economic, and cultural resource. Heritage valuation becomes a tool to better understand the significance of heritage to different sections of society. The valuation process aims to assess existing values as attached by the relevant population. However, the ultimate aim in the context of policy analysis is to value in order to achieve the valorisation of our heritage, in order words, to add new values to the existing ones. Therefore, valuation represents a crucial step in the management of cultural heritage and in regional development. Cultural heritage ownership rests with society which may also decide on the access conditions; in principle, no citizen can be excluded from its use. Clearly, the specific nature of cultural heritage as a collective good also implies that the investment and maintenance costs have to be covered by all citizens. Free ridership is not a meaningful option under such circumstances, so that usually taxation schemes – sometimes accompanied by private transaction schemes (such as entry tickets) or even subsidisation schemes – are put in place to ensure financial viability of maintaining the stock of cultural heritage. Consequently, valuation issues of cultural heritage deserve a prominent place in the socio-economic analysis of these assets. Cultural heritage has another feature which gives it a specific characteristic: it is usually unique in nature and hence not substitutable. Consequently, the social value of cultural heritage cannot be assessed by means of normal market transactions, as the usual conditions for market transactions are lacking. In conclusion, the evaluation of cultural heritage is fraught with many complex problems of both an economic and socio-cultural nature. There is not an unambiguous approach that has a universal validity. Rather, there are classes of assessment and evaluation methods that may be helpful in specific cases. . In the history of evaluation a wide variety of different methods has been developed, such as social cost-benefit analysis, planning balance sheet analysis, community impact assessment, multicriteria analysis, participatory group decision analysis, shadow project evaluation, and so forth. There is not a single best method, as the valuation of non-traded goods cannot be solved in a straightforward manner. The present paper aims to offer a concise introduction to the problems at hand and to discuss various classes of evaluation techniques that have been developed and employed in the past years. Despite the appreciation of the role played by cultural heritage in the development of the city, research efforts have not been sufficiently integrated to tackle the complex issues related to its conservation and the need to develop comprehensive approaches and methodologies for its management. Valuation methods play a strategic role in this context. They represent an essential tool to assess the value of urban heritage per se, the potential economic benefits of its transformation, the damage caused to it by environmental hazards, and the benefits of alternative management options for its exploitation. However, evaluation of cultural heritage cannot be based on generic assessment techniques, but has to be performed by tailor-made methods that address the specifications of cultural assets. This paper discusses a way forward. |
| Date: | 2004–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa04p314&r=geo |
| By: | Bruce Chapman; Ric Simes |
| Abstract: | There is an increasing recognition that economically disadvantaged areas do not have an inherent capacity to regenerate economic activity or to deliver automatically socially propitious outcomes. In such circumstances, there might be a strong case for public sector intervention of various types. In what follows we a case for the provision of financial resources for the establishment or consolidation of community social, and other, regional enterprises. The circumstances underlying the impotence of markets to solve financing issues are explored, and some attention is given to historical attempts to address the problem. Most importantly, we outline a potential new approach for the public sector in this area. An important and novel aspect of the exercise involves the government providing some proportion of the required finance in the form of a loan to be repaid by the enterprise only when and if the project becomes economically successful. This form of government intervention, known as income related loans, is designed to limit the extent of economic risks faced by the relevant enterprise, and has the desirable equity characteristic of repaying to taxpayers some return to their investment. Through reference to the Higher Education Contribution Scheme it is explained that the essential bases of this form of public sector approach to financing investment is well established, both conceptually and in administrative terms. |
| Keywords: | community investment; income related loans |
| JEL: | G18 G24 G38 |
| Date: | 2004–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:auu:dpaper:481&r=geo |
| By: | Lourens Broersma; Jouke Van Dijk |
| Abstract: | Main point in the current European policy debate is to find instruments that stimulate the growth rate of labour productivity. The reason for this is a persistent slowdown in labour productivity growth in European countries and an increasing gap in growth rates between the USA and Europe starting in the second half of the 1990’s. Labour productivity in the US is nowadays at a much steeper growth path than in Europe. What is the reason for this increasing gap between Europe and the USA? This is an important question in order to assess the measures proposed in the Lisbon Agreement by the European Union (EU) to become the world’s most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in 2010. With increasing globalisation and deregulation of international markets, productivity growth is the tool to enhance competitiveness. Therefore instruments are sought that will get the productivity growth rate in European countries back on track. One of the main explanatory factors for productivity growth is the production, use and diffusion of information and communication technology (ICT). Inklaar et al. (2003) show, however, that the main source for the European slowdown in productivity growth is not so much lagging IT use, but a deceleration of non-ICT capital deepening (i.e. lagging increase of non-ICT capital per hour worked) and, in contrast to the US, a lack of acceleration of TFP growth. TFP growth is the part of productivity growth that cannot be attributed to an increase in the capital stock per hour worked, where capital is usually subdivided in ICT capital and non-ICT capital. Daveri (2004), who applies a more rigorous definition of ICT using and ICT producing industries, by and large corroborates these results. The deceleration of non-ICT capital deepening of the nineties in Europe has coincided with a sharp rise in employment. Non-ICT capital deepening, or the growth of non-IT capital per hour worked, is clearly related to the growth rates of the price of both inputs. Faster wage growth increases non-ICT capital deepening because capital will substitute labour. An increase in the ‘price’ of non-ICT-capital, on the other hand, makes capital more expensive and leads to deceleration of non-ICT capital deepening. Inklaar et al. (2003), however, show that the impact of growth rates of wage and rental prices on non-ICT capital deepening is much stronger for the US than Europe. The small effect of wage growth in European countries implies that wage moderation might be an important reason for the slowdown of non-ICT capital deepening. Labour productivity growth in The Netherlands is at a persistently lower growth path than the European average. Since The Netherlands has been champion in wage moderation in the past decades, a natural question is whether this has led to an even slower non-ICT capital deepening than Europe or that other mechanisms have instead caused the Dutch slowdown of productivity growth. This issue will be addressed at a low spatial level: what is the reason for the Dutch slowdown, are there regions that have contributed more to the lagging productivity growth rate than others and which industries are responsible. This question will be answered using the growth accounting approach, which is also used to explain the widening of the productivity growth gap between Europe and the USA. Distinction can be made at the provincial level of The Netherlands between growth rates of value added in constant prices, number of hours worked, ICT and non-ICT capital services for eight aggregate industries. There is therefore sufficient detail to determine which industry in which province contributes positively or negatively to the lagging Dutch growth performance of the late 1990’s. This issue is useful from both an academic and a policy perspective. |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa05p62&r=geo |
| By: | Brett Anitra Gilbert; Mika Tatum Kusar |
| Abstract: | Geographic clusters have an impressive track record for producing innovative firms. In this research, we examine whether a geographic cluster location and the knowledge spillovers new ventures assimilate influence both their explorative and exploitative innovation activities. We hypothesize a stronger relationship of industry clustering on exploitative innovations but a stronger relationship of knowledge spillovers on explorative innovations. We expect the interaction will result in more exploitative innovations than explorative innovations. The data support most hypotheses. |
| Date: | 2006–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:esi:egpdis:2006-16&r=geo |
| By: | Chad Syverson |
| Abstract: | In markets where spatial competition is important, many models predict that average prices are lower in denser markets (i.e., those with more producers per unit area). Homogeneous-producer models attribute this effect solely to lower optimal markups. However, when producers instead differ in their production costs, a second mechanism also acts to lower equilibrium prices: competition-driven selection on costs. Consumers’ greater substitution possibilities in denser markets make it more difficult for high-cost firms to profitably operate, truncating the equilibrium cost (and price) distributions from above. This selection process can be empirically distinguished from the homogenous-producer case because it implies that not only do average prices fall as density rises, but that upper-bound prices and price dispersion should also decline as well. I find empirical support for this process using a rich set of price data from U.S. ready-mixed concrete plants. Features of the industry offer an arguably exogenous source of producer density variation with which to identify these effects. I also show that the findings do not simply result from lower factor prices in dense markets, but rather because dense-market producers are low-cost because they are more efficient. |
| Date: | 2004–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cen:wpaper:04-16&r=geo |
| By: | Edward Feser |
| Abstract: | Much research on agglomeration economies, and particularly recent work that builds on Marshall’s concept of the industrial district, postulates that benefits derived from proximity between businesses are strongest for small enterprises (Humphrey 1995, Sweeney and Feser 1998). With internal economies a function of the shape of the average cost curve and level of production, and external economies in shifts of that curve, a small firm enjoying external economies characteristic of industrial districts (or complexes or simply urbanized areas) may face the same average costs as the larger firm producing a higher volume of output (Oughton and Whittam 1997; Carlsson 1996; Humphrey 1995). Thus we observe the seeming paradox of large firms that enjoy internal economies of scale co-existing with smaller enterprises that should, by all accounts, be operating below minimum efficient scale. With the Birch-inspired debate on the relative job- and innovation-generating capacity of small and large firms abating (Ettlinger 1997), research on the small firm sector has shifted to an examination of the business strategies and sources of competitiveness of small enterprises (e.g., Pratten 1991, Nooteboom 1993). Technological external scale economies are a key feature of this research (Oughton and Whittam 1997). |
| Date: | 2004–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cen:wpaper:04-15&r=geo |