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Every year, thousands of refugees are forced to leave their countries of origin and are hosted by their neighboring countries. However, very little is known about the impact of these refugees on the local economy and its inhabitants. Based on a hypothesis formulated during a two-month iterative field research, a theoretical framework is used to understand how the refugee inflow would affect the good and labour markets of the local economy. We then test the theoretical predictions regarding the potential winners and losers among the refugee-hosting population, using household panel data collected in the region of Kagera in Tanzania. Our identification strategy exploits both time and spatial variations in the way households traced between 1991 and 2004 have been affected by the refugee inflows originating from Burundi (1993) and Rwanda (1994). Our results show that local hosts do not necessarily suffer from the refugee presence. Net economic benefits could even emerge provided a sufficient mass of refugees is gathered. Furthermore, the economic benefits appear to be unevenly distributed among the refugeehosting population. Agricultural workers are likely to suffer the most from an increase in competition on the labor markets and the surging prices of several goods. On the contrary, non-agricultural workers and self-employed farmers are in a better position to benefit from such a refugee inflow. We also conjecture that the welfare deterioration experienced by those involved into business could be explained a selection effect resulting from the reported entry of larger-scale entrepreneurs from other regions.

The living environment plays a key role in the "Aging in Place" strategy. We studied the influence of the built environment on the health status of elderly people living in Brussels. Using census and geo-coded data, we analysed whether built environment factors were associated with poor self-assessed health status and functional limitations of elderly residents (aged 65 and over). We concluded that evidence of such an association is weak and vulnerable to the composition of the neighbourhood.

The dynamics of house prices, sales, construction, and population growth in response to city-specific income shocks are characterized for 106 US cities. A dynamic model of search in the housing market in which construction, the entry of buyers, house prices, and sales are determined in equilibrium is then developed. The theory generates dynamics qualitatively consistent with the observations and a version calibrated to match key features of the US housing market offers a substantial quantitative improvement over models without search. In particular, variation in the time it takes to sell induces transaction prices to exhibit serially correlated growth. (JEL D83, R21, R23, R31) We explore the consequences of time-consuming search and matching for the dynamics of house prices, sales, and construction at the city level. First, we char acterize the impact of city-specific income shocks on the short-run dynamics of average house prices, home sales, construction, and population growth for a panel of US cities. We then develop a model in which the entry of new buyers and the construction of new houses in response to such shocks are endogenously determined. Our theory generates serial correlation in the growth rates of house prices and construction, even if income is strictly mean-reverting following shocks. 1 When calibrated to data on US cities our model accounts for over 80 percent of the variance of house price movements driven by city-specific income shocks and nearly half of the observed autocorrelation of house price growth. In our empirical analysis, we estimate a structural panel vector autoregressive (VAR ) model using city-level observations on the variables listed above. We focus

In the American South, post-bellum economic stagnation has been partially attributed to white landowners' access to low-wage black labor; indeed, Southern economic convergence from 1940 to 1970 was associated with substantial black out-migration. This paper examines the impact of the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 on agricultural development. Flooded counties experienced an immediate and persistent out-migration of black population. Over time, landowners in flooded counties dramatically mechanized and modernized agricultural production relative to landowners in nearby similar non-flooded counties. Landowners resisted black out-migration, however, benefiting from the status quo system of labor-intensive agricultural production.

One goal of state merit-based financial aid programs is to increase the stock of college-educated labor in the state by retaining college-educated persons in the state after college. However, there has been surprisingly little research on whether state merit aid programs are effective at this goal. This paper investigates the effect of state merit aid programs on the post-college location of 24–30 year olds. We use decennial census and American Community Survey microdata to consider post-college retention effects in the 25 states that implemented merit aid programs between 1991 and 2004. Our preferred specification implies that strong state merit aid programs on average increase the probability that a college attendee lives in his or her birth state during ages 24–30 by 2.76 percentage points. We also estimate the effect for individual states and find meaningful differences across states in the effect of merit aid programs on in-state post-college retention and explore explanations for these differences.

The spatial distribution of human capital plays a fundamental role for regional differences in economic growth and welfare. This paper examines how individual ability indicated by the grade point average (GPA), from comprehensive school, affects the probability of migration among young university graduates in Sweden. Using detailed micro data available from the Swedish population registers, the study examines two cohorts of individuals who enrol in tertiary education. The results indicate that individual abilities reflected by the GPA are strongly influential when it comes to completing a university degree and for the migration decision after graduation. Moreover, there is a positive relationship between the GPA and the choice of migrating from regions with a relatively low tax base and a relatively small share of highly educated people in the population. Analogously, individuals with a high GPA tend to stay at a higher rate in more flourishing regions.

The onset of World War I spurred the “Great Migration” of African Americans from the US South, arguably the most important internal migration in US history. We create a new panel dataset of more than 5,000 men matched from the 1910 to 1930 census manuscripts to address three interconnected questions: To what extent was there selection into migration? How large were the migrants’ gains? Did migration narrow the racial gap in economic status? We find evidence of positive selection, but the migrants’ gains were large. A substantial amount of black-white convergence in this period is attributable to migration. (JEL J15, J61, N32, N92, R23)

The National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 (NREGA) is the flagship programme of the UPA Government that directly touches lives of the poor and promotes inclusive growth. NREGA is the first ever law internationally, that guarantees wage employment at an unprecedented scale. NREGA is designed as a safety net to reduce migration by rural poor households in the lean period through a hundred days of guaranteed unskilled manual labour provided when demanded at minimum wage on works focused on water conservation, land development & drought proofing. This study is proposed to examine that how MGNREGA is impacting the lives of millions of people living in rural areas and the citizens living below poverty line. Dr. Jean Drèze, a Belgian born economist, at the Delhi School of Economics, has been a major influence on this project. MGNREGA is an Act to provide a legal guarantee of 100 days of wage employment in a financial year to every rural household whose adult members volunteer to do unskilled manual work. He/she will get the minimum wage rate notified for agricultural labour in the State until the Central Government notifies a minimum wage rate, which in any case shall not be less than Rs. 60 per day. NREGA came into effect on February 2, 2006.

Nowadays due to globalization, the concept of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has gained utmost importance and has become a worldwide concept whereby organisations consider the interests of society by taking responsibility for the impact of their activities. In India CSR is in a budding stage and facing daunting social and environmental challenges due consider social and environmental aspects through their CSR for their sustainability and development. CSR covers almost all issues like the use of child labor; inequality of employment; environmental impact; involvement in local community; products’ safety; company cultures; brand image and reputation etc. and it is one of the parameters to judge the performance of a company . Sustainability refers to an organization’s activities, typically considered voluntary, that demonstrate the inclusion of social and environmental concerns in business operations and in interactions with stakeholders. Against this backdrop, an attempt has been made to overview the CSR practices in India.

Saharanpur is famous for its wood-carving industry. The Shivalik range provides the raw material for the industry. Woodwork of Saharanpur is exported to various countries like Germany, U.K., USA, Canada, Kuwait, Sweden, Singapore etc. Alike other handicraft industries, skilled craftsmanship are the principal feature of wood-carving industry of Saharanpur. On the other hand, a major part of wood-carving industry is in the hands of the middlemen. As a tradition, most of them carry their small-scale units and work on contract basis. They constitute a real link between the artisans, the exporters and the foreign buyers. Hence, the progress of wood-carving industry of Saharanpur primarily depends upon the craftsmanship of artisans along with professional skill of middlemen and exporters.

Cities are the cradle of a wide range of cultural, social, and technological innovations that are at the heart of modern economic growth and development. Half of humanity today lives in cities but, until the last two decades, economists have paid much less attention to cities than have other social scientists. By contrast, geographers have long studied the role of cities in human affairs. Michael Batty, a distinguished scholar in the field of human geography, has recently written The New Science of Cities, a synthesis of his work and of some other prominent urban geographers. A review of his book is the first objective of this essay. The second is to discuss and compare the tools and concepts developed by urban economists with those of urban geographers in the hope of triggering a fruitful debate between those two groups of social scientists. (JEL R10, R23, R30, R40, R58)

In various surveys, presence of measurement errors has led to misleading results in estimation of various population parameters. This study indicates the effects of measurement errors on estimates of population total and population variance when samples are drawn using systematic sampling technique from a stratified population. A finite population was generated through simulation. The population was then stratified into four strata followed by generation of ten samples in each of them using systematic sampling technique. In each stratum a sample was picked at random. The findings of this work indicated that systematic errors affected the accuracy of the estimates by overestimating both the population total and the population variance. Random errors only added variability to the data but their effect on the estimates of the population total and population variance was not that profound.

The aim of this paper is to study the evolution of urban hierarchies and the nature of urban growth processes in Greece from 1951 to 2011 using data provided by the Greek Statistical Authority. The paper delivers three series of results: firstly, when using an administrative definition of the city, the Greek cities converge towards a middle city-size population; secondly, when taking into account spatial dependence, the sizes of Greek cities still converge but this movement starts in the middle of the period, after 1981. In both cases, the preeminence of the Athens agglomeration slowly decreases; finally, the paper delivers evidence concerning the changes that affect urban demographical trends in Greece over the last decade. These changes can be related to the economic crisis and the profound socioeconomic upheaval that Greece has undergone since the beginning of the 21st century.

The paper discusses an important, from the perspective of the development of peripheral areas, problem of migration among youth. The weakness of the potential of disadvantaged areas contributes to the strengthening of disadvantageous demographic, economic or cultural trends which, as a consequence, makes submontane areas of the Małopolska or Podkarpacie regions distant from large urban centers, being doomed to stagnation and becomes a push factor for next generations of their inhabitants. The phenomenon very frequently affects graduates and young people who, in the beginning of their professional careers, encounter considerable barriers on the Polish labor market. The paper analyses a potential scale of internal and external migrations, assesses the importance of factors determining the selection of migration destination and the importance of elements affecting the nature of jobs undertaken, taking into account payroll expectations of potential migrants. Its key element was also a balance of potential benefits and losses resulting from mass labor migration from two perspectives: of migrants and their families, and of consequences of decisions to migrate affecting local communities.

The poverty alleviation programmes of the Ministry of Rural Development are designed to act as safety nets to the poor during the times of crisis even while addressing partly the multi-dimensional poverty. The National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005, a social protection programme, has emerged as a major theme in development discourses perhaps due to its scale of finance and adoption of ‘rights’ based framework. What has been its overall impact and in particular on rural poverty? The effect of MNREGS would be positive for these farm households if the community and individual works undertaken under the scheme help in productivity enhancement of agriculture. Field evidence needs to be systematically analyzed before drawing conclusions of the programme impact.

In the immediate aftermath of World War II, millions of German expellees were resettled into the new borders of Germany, but not into the parts of Germany that were occupied by France. Using a spatial regression discontinuity framework, I estimate the persistence of the population shock over a 20-year-period. Between 1945 and 1950, the inflow of people increased the population in municipalities where expellees could settle by 21.6 percent. The difference in population levels is highly persistent and remained 17.8 percent in 1970. The results suggest that population patterns in the region that I study were not determined by locational fundamentals. (JEL J11, N34, R12, R23)

Employment guarantee programs have often been used by developing countries to ensure livelihood of the poorer sections of the society without recourse to physical or human capital. India started the world’s largest such program in 2005 in the form of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme in the background of jobless growth during most part of the nineties, stagnation or even decline in agricultural productivity, and increased migration of poor people from rural to urban areas. The scheme was devised as a public work programme with a rights based approach to development, providing income security through guaranteed wage employment. Present paper analyses the Indian experience by examining the working of the scheme in a lagging region, where supposedly the scheme should be both necessary and beneficial.

This paper investigates the effect of early exposure to neighborhoodcrime on subsequent criminal behavior of youth exploiting a uniquenatural experiment between 1986 and 1998 when refugee immigrantsto Denmark were assigned to neighborhoods quasi-randomly. Wefind strong evidence that the share of young people convicted forcrimes, in particular violent crimes, in the neighborhood increasesconvictions of male assignees later in life. No such effects are foundfor other measures of neighborhood crime including the rate ofcommitted crimes. Our findings suggest social interaction as a keychannel through which neighborhood crime is linked to individualcriminal behavior. This paper investigates the effect of early exposure to neighborhood crime on subsequent criminal behavior of youth exploiting a unique natural experiment between 1986 and 1998 when refugee immigrants to Denmark were assigned to neighborhoods quasi-randomly. We find strong evidence that the share of young people convicted for crimes, in particular violent crimes, in the neighborhood increases convictions of male assignees later in life. No such effects are found for other measures of neighborhood crime including the rate of committed crimes. Our findings suggest social interaction as a key channel through which neighborhood crime is linked to individual criminal behavior

The objective of this paper is to explore the role of some quantitative variables in explaining housing prices, and how these variables can be used for the spatial delimitation of housing submarkets. The methodological strategy incorporates issues from the spatial economic theory, and an econometric model of hedonic prices to analyze the main characteristics of housing demand in Mexico City. Housing submarkets are delimited by using a statistical multivariate tool, two-step, log likelihood cluster analysis, in terms of intra-urban relative house differentials. The models are estimated using cross-sectional data from the 2010 micro-data of Mexico's National Survey of the Households' Incomes and Expenditures.

This study develops an overlapping generations model that involves the endogenous determination of demographic and city structure to fully analyze the social and natural changes in city populations. We provide conditions under which the model exhibits the spatial features of demography observed in urban areas: city centres have a lower total fertility rate than suburbs and larger cities have a lower total fertility rate than smaller cities. Through calibration, we also show that spatial factors have a significant impact on demographic characteristics and city growth.

The objective of this paper is to provide some empirical evidence of relevant risk factors and causal mechanisms to understand criminal behavior in Romania. In order to achieve this goal, some socio-economic variables are considered: long-term unemployment rate and people at risk of poverty or social exclusion and, as crime variables we use four different types of crimes: domestic burglary, homicide, motor vehicle theft and robbery. At the regional level, the results of our panel data analysis, using data regarding the development regions of Romania for a time span between 2008 and 2010, supports the thesis of a direct and significant correlation between poverty and crime. Our results thus indicate that for Romania poverty is a significant risk factor in predicting crime and unemployment is not a significant risk factor even if we considered the long-term unemployment.

La interacción social y económica entre pequeñas unidades espaciales es un fenómeno que indudablemente cobra mayor persistencia a través del tiempo. Esto implica que los mercados laborales se expanden a través del espacio principalmente por la continua reducción de los costos de transporte. Así, la mayor interacción entre unidades espaciales sugiere la potencial existencia de macro mercados laborales que son etiquetadas como regiones funcionales. Construir regiones funcionales para el caso de Chile es un reto debido al rol que juega la localización de los recursos naturales produciendo de esta manera la conmutación a larga distancia. Este documento contribuye con la construcción de Regiones Urbanas Funcionales (RUF) para el caso de Chile utilizando el método Intramax. También proponemos una alternativa para incorporar los efectos de la conmutación de larga distancia. Nuestros resultados indican que las RUF construidas a partir del algoritmo Intramax incorporando criterios para tratar la conmutación a larga distancia presentan mayores beneficios., Social and economic interaction among small spatial units is a phenomenon that has undoubtedly become more and more persistent in time. This implies that labor markets expand through space mainly due to the continuous decrease of transport costs. Thus, greater interaction among spatial units suggests the potential existence of macro labor markets labeled as functional regions. Building functionalregions for Chile is a challenge owing to the role played by the localization of natural resources, thus resulting in long-distance commutation. This document contributes to the construction of Functional Urban Regions (FUR) using Intramax method for the case of Chile. In addition, an alternative is proposed to include the effects of long-distance commutation. Results show that FURs built from Intramax algorithm that incorporate process long-distance commutation criteria show greater benefits.

Over the last decade, alongside high unemployment rates, the number of discouraged workers remained high in Turkey indicating a structural problem of the labor market. Moreover, the ratio of men among discouraged workers is particularly important compared to other OECD countries where the discouragement is thought to be related to gender issues. Discouraged worker literature mainly investigates differences in the transition rates from unemployment and discouragement into employment. Few studies, however, explicitly explore who becomes discouraged and why. In the Turkish labor market, the average transition from unemployment into discouragement is important and displays vast inter-regional disparities implying that local labor market (LLM) conditions matter. This paper aims to address factors affecting transition to discouragement in the Turkish labor market using pooled cross-section data from household labor force surveys for the period between 2006 and 2011, considering individual and household characteristics, as well as various LLM conditions. Our findings indicate that low qualifications and poor market conditions both lead to higher discouragement.

Social networks have gained wider relevance in economics and other interdisciplinary sciences in recent era. Various literature and studies have been undertaken to assess the role and impact of social networks on migration. At one side it encourages migration and on other side to some extent it also acts as entry barrier and thus restricts migration if it is based on any caste, creed, religion or region. The literature on role of social network in migration is under explored as there is dearth of proper data source and is also difficult to evaluate. The present paper thus fills this gap. The paper makes an attempt to assess the applicability of network theory for the analysis of migration from Uttar Pradesh to Mumbai. The paper will unravel existing studies and literature across various disciplines on role of social networks in facilitating migration. To support the objectives and findings from literature, the study carry out a primary survey of 50 Auto-rickshaw and Taxi drivers at Andheri, Khar East, Chembur- Deonar and Jogeshwari in Mumbai. Snowball methodology has been used for selection of sites and study is solely based on primary data. Collected data were tabulated and analyzed with simple statistical tools. Finding of the study is that network positively affects migration decision by reducing transfer costs both in physical and monetary terms. Study by employing exhaustive literature review and field survey found that social networks encourage migration. Migration from eastern Uttar Pradesh to Mumbai is, to a large extent facilitated by social networks in case of auto and taxi drivers.

This study uses cross-sectional data to investigate regional differences in women's participation in the labor market. Women's participation is high in the northern coastal region of Japan. This high rate of participation is caused by the fact that married women with children participate as regular full-time employees. Supply and demand factors explain part of the differences, but regional effects remain even after controlling for them. I attribute the high participation in the northern coastal region to long-standing norms regarding women's work.

The global expansion of urban slums poses questions for economic research as well as problems for policymakers. We provide evidence that the type of poverty observed in contemporary slums of the developing world is characteristic of that described in the literature on poverty traps. We document how human capital threshold effects, investment inertia, and a “policy trap” may prevent slum dwellers from seizing economic opportunities offered by geographic proximity to the city. We test the assumptions of another theory—that slums are a just transitory phenomenon characteristic of fastgrowing economies—by examining the relationship between economic growth, urban growth, and slum growth in the developing world, and whether standards of living of slum dwellers are improving over time, both within slums and across generations. Finally, we discuss why standard policy approaches have often failed to mitigate the expansion of slums in the developing world. Our aim is to inform public debate on the essential issues posed by slums in the developing world.

Understanding the degree of geographical crime displacement is crucial for the design of crime prevention policies. This paper documents changes in automobile theft risk that were generated by the plausibly exogenous introduction of Lojack, a highly effective stolen vehicle recovery device, into a number of new Ford car models in some Mexican states, but not others. Lojack-equipped vehicles in Lojack-coverage states experienced a 48 percent reduction in theft risk due to deterrence effects. However, 18 percent of the reduction in thefts was displaced toward unprotected Lojack models in non-Lojack states, providing new evidence of geographical crime displacement in auto theft. (JEL H76, H77, K42, O17, O18, R23)

This paper explores hypotheses of hierarchical migration using data from the Alaskan Arctic. We focus on migration of Iñupiat people, who are indigenous to the region, and explore the role of income and subsistence harvests on migration. To test related hypotheses we use confidential micro-data from the US Census Bureau’s 2000 Decennial Census of Population and Income and generate migration probabilities using a mixed multinomial and conditional logit model. Our findings are broadly consistent with Ravenstein’s (1885) early hypothesis of step-wise migration; we find evidence of step-wise migration, both up and down an urban and rural hierarchy. We also find that where migrants choose to live is a function of place, personal, and household characteristics.

This paper explores the causes and consequences of regional taste differences. I introduce habit formation into a standard general equilibrium model. Household tastes evolve over time to favor foods consumed as a child. Thus, locally abundant foods are preferred in every region, as they were relatively inexpensive in prior generations. These patterns alter the correspondence between price changes and nutrition. For example, neglecting this relationship between tastes and agro-climatic endowments overstates the short-run nutritional gains from agricultural trade liberalization, since preferred foods rise in price in every region. I examine the model's predictions using household survey data from many regions of India. (JEL D12, I12, O12, O18, R23)

Chances are high that not both partners in dual-earner couples stay in employment after long-distance moves, because jobs are distributed heterogeneously in space. Previous research shows that women are more likely to leave employment than men. I extend this literature by adding evidence from Germany and by comparing the effects of moves in Britain, West and East Germany with data from the BHPS and the SOEP. My results show that women in dual-earner couples are more likely to leave employment after moves in Britain and West Germany compared to stayers, while women in East Germany are not adversely affected.Read More: http://ejournals.duncker-humblot.de/doi/abs/10.3790/schm.133.2.133

This paper reviews the evidence on the efficacy of neighborhood and school interventions in improving the long-run outcomes of children growing up in poor families. We focus on studies exploiting exogenous sources of variation in neighborhoods and schools and which examine at least medium-term outcomes. Higher-quality neighborhoods improve family safety, adult subjective well-being and health, and girls' mental health. But they have no detectable impact on youth human capital, labor market outcomes, or risky behaviors. In contrast, higher-quality schools can improve children's academic achievement and can have longer-term positive impacts of increasing educational attainment and earnings and reducing incarceration and teen pregnancy.

Bande R. and Karanassou M. Spanish regional unemployment revisited: the role of capital accumulation, Regional Studies. This paper provides new evidence for the evolution of regional unemployment rates in Spain over the period between 1980 and 2000. It argues that interactive dynamic systems of labour demand, wage setting and labour force equations (1) allow for a richer interpretation of regional disparities, and (2) can capture the unemployment effects of growing variables such as capital stock. After classifying the seventeen Spanish regions into high and low unemployment groups using kernel and cluster techniques, a structural labour market model is estimated for each group and the unemployment contributions of investment, benefits, taxes and the oil price are evaluated. It is found that the main driving force of regional unemployment swings is capital accumulation.

This paper empirically assesses the incidence and efficiency of Round I of the federal urban Empowerment Zone (EZ) program using confidential microdata from the Decennial Census and the Longitudinal Business Database. To ground our welfare analysis, we develop a heterogeneous agent general equilibrium model in which the distortions generated by place-based policies depend upon a set of reduced form elasticities which our empirical work centers on estimating. Using rejected and future applicants to the EZ program as controls we find that EZ designation substantially increased employment in zone neighborhoods, particularly for zone residents. The program also generated wage increases for workers from zone neighborhoods worth approximately $320M per year. Based upon estimates of the number of jobs created for zone residents, we find that EZ employment credits generated deadweight costs equal to (at most) seven percent of their flow cost.

This paper provides a quantitative analysis of how the changing dual economic structure and urbanization affect inequality in Asia. Focusing on data for four countries—the Peoples’ Republic of China, India, Indonesia, and the Philippines—the paper asks three questions. First, how much of the past increase in inequality can be attributed to urbanization per se—the rising share of urban population, as opposed to other drivers related to the region's dual economic structure, such as the urban–rural income gap, inequality within the urban sector, and inequality within the rural sector? Second, how might urbanization affect these countries’ inequality in the future as its process continues? Third, moving forward, what is the relative importance of each of these drivers in containing rising inequality in Asia? It is hoped that the framework developed and calculations presented in this paper provide more insights into the dynamics of rising inequality in Asia and can help policy makers prioritize policy actions for confronting it. © 2013 Asian Development Bank and Asian Development Bank Institute.

Geographical distribution of unemployment rates has been analyzed from different methodological perspectives in theoretical and empirical studies. In recent years, researcher on regional unemployment persistence which deals with the spatial autocorrelation in the levels and dynamics of unemployment has increased. Following this line, our study presents new evidence about the behaviour of provincial unemployment rates in Spain. First, descriptive techniques are used to investigate the disparity and persistent differences in unemployment rates in the Spanish provinces (NUTS-3) during the period 1998-2007. Then, we use spatial filtering techniques in a panel estimation framework to check the existence of spatial patterns which are significant over time. Our results clearly show the existence of a process of polarization and persistent disparities in unemployment rates between the provinces with high unemployment rates and those with low values.

This paper analyzes the behavior of Central and Eastern European migrants regarding money remitting to their country of origin and is based on data provided by the National Immigrant Survey of Spain. In order to analyze the impacts of migrants? demographic and economic characteristics on remitting behavior, the variables employed in the econometric model referred to individual factors, factors that evaluate the migrant?s links with the native country and those that account for the degree of migrant?s integration in Spain. The factors showing a stronger attachment to relatives and the country of origin have a positive impact on the decision to remit and on the remitted amounts, while the factors that point to the integration of the migrant into Spanish society have a negative and smaller impact on the remitting decision.

This discussion paper resulted in an article in the Journal of Regional Science (2013). Volume 53, issue 1, pages 8-36. This paper identifies the role of cultural diversity in explaining spatial disparities in wages and housing prices across Dutch cities, using unique individual panel data of home owners. We distinguish between the effects of interactions-based productivity, consumption amenities and sorting of heterogeneous home owners while controlling for interactions between the labor and housing market. We find that an increase in the cultural diversity of the population positively impacts equilibrium wages and housing prices, particularly in the largest and most densely populated cities. This result is largely driven by spatial sorting of individuals in both the labor and housing market. After controlling for home owner heterogeneity we find that increasing cultural diversity no longer impacts local labor markets and negatively impacts local housing markets. The latter result is likely to be driven by a negative causal effect of increased cultural diversity on neighb orhood quality that outweighs a positive effect of increased cultural diversity in consumption goods.

The aim of the paper is both delimitation attempt and characteristics of Bydgoszcz-Toruń Functional (Metropolitan) Area, in the light of selected indicators relating to socio-demographic determinants and functional relationships of the analysed area. Issues relating to socio-demographic factors are shown in the background of the situation in Poland. However, a functional relationship was analysed in the context of transport links and public transport situation in the metropolitan area.

A large literature has documented a significant increase in the return to college over the past 30 years. This increase is typically measured using nominal wages. I show that from 1980 to 2000, college graduates have increasingly concentrated in metropolitan areas that are characterized by a high cost of housing. This implies that college graduates are increasingly exposed to a high cost of living and that the relative increase in their real wage may be smaller than the relative increase in their nominal wage. To measure the college premium in real terms, I deflate nominal wages using a new CPI that allows for changes in the cost of housing to vary across metropolitan areas and education groups. I find that half of the documented increase in the return to college between 1980 and 2000 disappears when I use real wages. This finding does not appear to be driven by differences in housing quality and is robust to a number of alternative specifications. The implications of this finding for changes in well-being inequality depend on why college graduates sort into expensive cities. Using a simple general equilibrium model, I consider two alternative explanations. First, it is possible that the relative supply of college graduates increases in expensive cities because college graduates are increasingly attracted by amenities located in those cities. In this case, higher cost of housing reflects consumption of desirable local amenities, and there may still be a significant increase in well-being inequality even if the increase in real wage inequality is limited. Alternatively, it is possible that the relative demand of college graduates increases in expensive cities due to shifts in the relative productivity of skilled labor. In this case, the relative increase in skilled workers' standard of living is offset by higher cost of living. The empirical evidence indicates that relative demand shifts are more important than relative supply shifts, suggesting that the increase in well-being inequality between 1980 and 2000 is smaller than the increase in nominal wage inequality.

The paper underlines that both the incentive and the concrete design of strategies/procedures are powerfully triggered by the environment of the program meant to reduce the gaps, i.e. the individual restricted rural structure circumstances. The transferability of '˜good practice' is given to a partial extent only. However, this paper provides a fine indication of '˜what can be done' and, in spite of the heterogeneity of European rural areas and the recognized types of social capital initiatives, the comparative study of the various approaches allows for the elaboration of some general recommendations to be followed when appealing in rural progress policy design based on social capital.

This study uses geo-coded data from 11 waves (2000 – 2010) of the SOEP to investigate gender differences in the spatial mobility of N = 2,072 young adults initially leaving their parental home. In West Germany, we find no gender differences in moving distances. In East Germany, young women are considerably more mobile than men. Almost 30% of East German women move across 100 km or more, compared to only 18% of East German men. The multivariate models reveal that these differences are not explained by the gender gap in education. Instead, they are attributable to East German women's higher propensity of moving to West Germany.

We estimate the degree of co-movement and cyclical synchronization of formal employment across Mexican states. As a measure of formal employment we use the number of workers with permanent contracts registered at the Instituto Mexicano del Seguro Social (IMSS) in each state between July 1997 and December 2011. We find that Mexican states are highly heterogeneous with respect to the degree of association between the fluctuations of state and national employment levels. Fluctuations in state employment are highly cross-correlated only among 12 of the 32 states, and the sources of these fluctuations seem to be the shocks to national employment. Cyclical synchronization across states’ employment levels and between state and national employment levels is high among these states, although only in 4 of them the number of contractions estimated equaled that of national employment; these 12 states are located in the northern border with the United States, in the western-central and the central regions of the country. On the contrary, in states where the degree of co-movement between state and national employment is low –as it is the case in northwest-central, southern, and east-southern states–, the source of state employment fluctuations seems to be mainly associated with regional or state factors. Among this latter group of states employment does not exhibit cycles of the classical type, or if they do exhibit such cycles the degree of cyclical synchronization with national employment is very low.

Why is prosperity distributed so unevenly across America's metropolitan areas? While population growth has gone disproportionately towards the Sunbelt, high-skill areas have experienced the strongest income growth since 1970. Gaps between more and less educated areas were modest forty years ago, but they have become quite large, and far larger than would be predicted solely by the general rise in the returns to skill. Unemployment rates during the recent recession were also strongly correlated with area level education. This essay reviews Enrico Moretti's The New Geography of Jobs, which both describes and explains these significant regional trends. (JEL I32, J24, R12, R23, R32)

This paper uses micro data from the Labor Force Surveys to examine regional wage differentials and their dynamics in Poland over 1994-2007. We find that controlling for observed worker characteristics reduces regional wage disparity by 30-50 percent, but remaining wage differentials persist and seem to intensify over time.

real time. For the strategic planning on town level to be relevant, effective and efficient, the public administration authorities must take into account the importance of conducting certain analyses and of some strategic documents at neighborhood level. The Urban Development Integrated Plan of the city of Baia Mare, is aimed at the public intervention on a well-defined area needing regeneration because of social, economic, territorial, functional and environmental discrepancies, as compared to other urban areas of the municipality. The perspective of the Urban Observer has as its basis the permanent monitoring of urban indicators as well as the implication of all interested parties, including the citizens in view of defining the strategic directions of town development.

A gazdaságfejlesztési programok általában a foglalkoztatás növelésének útjaként a munkahelyteremtést jelölik meg, pedig az csak egy a gazdaságpolitika transzmissziós csatornái közül. A szerzők munkapiaci térökonometriai modelljük keretei között - az elmúlt húsz év tényadataira és egy makrogazdasági prognózisra támaszkodva - azt vizsgálják, hogy milyen kapcsolat áll fenn a gazdaság munkaerőigénye és a foglalkoztatás között, mekkorák a munkahelyteremtés foglalkoztatási hatásai és lehetőségei. Területi összefüggések szerint, kistérségi paneladatokon identifikált modelljük a munkahelyteremtés szignifikáns, de enyhe hatását jelzi. Nagyságrenddel fontosabb tényező a munkaerő foglalkoztathatósága és a makrogazdasági konjunktúra. Az elemzések azt mutatják, hogy a munkahelyteremtéssel létrehozott munkahelyeknek csak kis része (többnyire kevesebb mint egytizede) növeli tartósan a foglalkoztatást, és azok többsége sem feltétlenül helyben, hanem adott esetben a fejlesztéssel szomszédos, olyan kistérségekben növeli a foglalkoztatást, ahol nagyobb a munkaerő-felesleg. A munkaerőpiacok - a nagyvárosok és kiemelkedően Budapest térségének kivételével - a foglalkoztatható munkaerő szűkösségét mutatják, és ezt a támogatások felfutása tovább erősíti. Az országos munkahely-teremtési programok foglalkoztatási kilátásai az évtized közepén kevéssé biztatók, ebben az időszakban célszerűbb a fejlesztéspolitika foglalkoztatási céljának eléréséhez a többi csatorna használata. Journal of Economic Literature (JEL) kód: C23, R15, R23., Although job creation is only one of the transmission channels of economic policy, it is usually cited in development programmes as the route to increasing employment. Based on two decades data and a macroeconomic forecast, the authors analyse interference between job demand and employment, and the impacts and potential of job creation. The spatial econometric job-market model identified in local panel data shows a significant, but small employment impact by job creation: the impacts of employability and of the business cycle are larger by an order of magnitude. Analysis shows that only a fragment (generally less than 10 percent) of jobs created result in permanent employment. Extra employment is usually generated not locally, but rather in neighbouring districts with an ample employable workforce. Most local job markets, with the notable exception of bigger cities and especially Budapest, are generally short of employable workforce, a lack accentuated by the unfolding development programmes. The employment prospects from job-creation programmes from the mid-decade are depressing. It is more effective to attain employment goals by concentrating economic policy on other transmission channels.

The paper also presents a series of subsequent tools that provide the support for the complex tools regarding the important aspects of local and territorial development, such as strategic planning, sustainable development strategies, integrated development plans. The reference point of this reasearch is represented by the management process in the public administration in the city of Baia Mare for which there are, in the general economy of the paper, the most complex resources for an empirical research. The Baia Mare Urban System presented in this paper has all the characteristics of a model structure of polycentric development that has elaborated/formulated a development overview on long and medium- term with all the strategic, tactical and operational elements that support the development within a well defined territory. The approach on both components (institutional, territorial) has a complex character but at the same time,a unitary one. The promotion of polycentric and balanced territorial development as an essential element for the territorial cohesion realization represents one of the priorities of Europe Strategy 2020. In this context, the formation and consolidation of the development poles as basic elements for the creation of polycentric networks must be supported by integrated politics at local and regional level. The study cases outlined in the paper represent models for the use of different public management tools in concrete situations that cover most of the fields aproached in local administration.

We study multiregional extension of Krugman's Core-Periphery model. Comprehensive characterization of agglomeration stability is obtained in terms of the basic parameters of model. In particular, conditions of uniqueness of the stable total agglomerated equilibrium were obtained. The main feature of this paper is that the considered model is asymmetric, i.e., uneven allocation of the immobile (agricultural) population across regions is allowed. Unlike the previously known results for asymmetric CP model, which were based on numerical simulations, this research is quite analytical.

Households “sort” across neighborhoods according to their wealth and their preferences for public goods, social characteristics, and commuting opportunities. The aggregation of these individual choices in markets and in other institutions influences the supply of amenities and local public goods. Pollution, congestion, and the quality of public education are examples. Over the past decade, advances in economic models of this sorting process have led to a new framework that promises to alter the ways we conceptualize the policy evaluation process in the future. These “equilibrium sorting” models use the properties of market equilibria, together with information on household behavior, to infer structural parameters that characterize preference heterogeneity. The results can be used to develop theoretically consistent predictions for the welfare implications of future policy changes. Analysis is not confined to marginal effects or a partial equilibrium setting. Nor is it limited to prices and quantities. Sorting models can integrate descriptions of how nonmarket goods are generated, estimate how they affect decision making, and, in turn, predict how they will be affected by future policies targeting prices or quantities. Conversely, sorting models can predict how equilibrium prices and quantities will be affected by policies that target product quality, information, or amenities generated by the sorting process. These capabilities are just beginning to be understood and used in applied research. This survey article aims to synthesize the state of knowledge on equilibrium sorting, the new possibilities for policy analysis, and the conceptual and empirical challenges that define the frontiers of the literature. (JEL C63, D04, E61, H41, R23, R31, R38)

This paper looks at the factors that influence an entrepreneur's decision to stay or move out of a neighbourhood. In general, new and relatively small firms tend to have a strong connection to their local environment and hardly ever move across large distances. Aspects of the building (e.g. size) are the most likely reason to move, but does the neighbourhood itself matter as well? We look to what extent neighbourhood aspects influence or have influenced the decision to stay or move, both on the push and the pull side. These aspects may be related to the local physical environment or the safety situation, but also to the local social community. We conducted in-depth semi-structured interviews with 40 entrepreneurs from five urban neighbourhoods in the Netherlands. The sample is equally divided between firms that stayed and firms that recently moved out of the neighbourhood (20/20). The survey provides detailed information on the characteristics and the performance of firms, as well as network contacts, neighbourhood attachment, location choice, and the valuation of location aspects. We make use of qualitative methods in order to analyze our data. Overall, we found that the reasons behind firm relocation propensity are explained by a combination of the factors put forth in the neoclassical, behavioural and, to a lesser extent, also the institutional strand of literature. Costs, space, market and accessibility aspects are indeed important reasons for both actual and planned relocation, but they cannot be seen apart from other reasons relating to the entrepreneur as an individual. What stands out is that in general, firms move because firm-internal developments (growth) or, in the case of home-based entrepreneurs, because changes in the household situation or housing preferences make relocation necessary. Aspects of the weak neighbourhood itself are only regarded as problematic, and consequently influence relocation propensity, when these aspects directly affect firm performance.