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This paper analyzes the effect of new bicycle lanes on traffic volume, congestion, and accidents. Crucially, the new bike lanes replace existing car lanes thereby reducing available space for motorized traffic. In order to obtain causal estimates, I exploit the quasi-random timing and location of the newly built cycle lanes. Using an event study design, a two-way fixed effects model and the synthetic control group method on geo-coded data, I show that the construction of pop-up bike lanes significantly reduced average car speed by 8 to 12 percentage points (p.p.) and up to 16 p.p. in peak traffic hours. In contrast, the results for car volume are modest, while the data does not allow for a conclusive judgment of accidents.

We examine day-to-day fluctuations in worker-level output at two manufacturing sites located in different industrial towns in China. Ambient air pollution in both towns, as proxied alternatively by fine-particle (PM2.5) and sulfur dioxide (SO2) levels, is severe but significantly variable, in part due to exogenous atmospheric ventilation. Across sites, pollution proxies and estimators, and correcting for worker heterogeneity and seasonality, we find a precisely estimated zero response on daily worker output from concurrent (same-shift) variation in air pollution. This is consistent with the stated perceptions of managers during our visits to over 10 firms in four provinces. We then follow the epidemiological literature and allow worker outcomes to respond to day-to-day variation in pollution with up to 30 days of delay. We uncover statistically significant adverse output effects from more prolonged pollution exposure, but these effects are not large. The cumulative effect – scaled for a large +10 μg/m3 PM2.5 variation in exposure on the day of output and on each of the previous 25 days – amounts to -0.5 to -3% of mean daily output. Estimates using SO2 are similar. Consistent with a simple model, more productive workers tend to respond more to pollution.

We analyze the effect of the Öresund Bridge, a combined railway and motorway bridge between Swedish Malmö and the Danish capital Copenhagen, on inventive activity in the region of Malmö. Applying difference-in-difference estimation on individual-level data, our findings suggest that the Öresund Bridge led to a significant increase in the number of patents per individual in the Malmö region as compared to the two other major regions in Sweden, Gothenburg and Stockholm. We show that a key mechanism is the attraction of highly qualified workers to the Malmö region following the construction of the bridge.

Drawing on a new and comprehensive measure of logistics quality, our gravity model suggests logistics in the exporting and partner-country can have an important impact on bilateral exports. A one standard deviation improvement in the exporter’s logistics quality, which for example would improve Gabon to the level of Guinea, would raise exports by almost 60%. Landlocked countries’ exports depend on their neighbours’ logistics, but their own logistics quality is not as important as for other countries. We also find that logistics act to reduce the trade effects of distance, but without eliminating them.

Millennium development goal (MDG) of poverty reduction aims for halving of the head-count ratio over the period 1990-2015. Available studies draw attention to the gap between observed and required growth rates, the difficulties of sustaining the latter over time, and whether the policy stance of a government makes a difference to its overall performance. Trade-offs between growth and redistribution in achieving the MDG have also been examined. The present study builds on earlier work in several respects. A two-stage procedure is developed in which income per capita depends on agricultural GDP, a measure of openness of the economy, and regional characteristics in the first stage, and poverty depends on the (estimated) income per capita, a measure of income inequality, and regional characteristics in the second stage. Alternative estimation techniques – including a panel data method- have been employed to check the robustness of the results. The feasibility of halving poverty is examined at the global, regional and country levels. The gaps between required and observed growth rates of aggregate and agricultural income, and the trade-offs between growth and redistribution of income are assessed. While doubts persist about the feasibility of halving poverty in some regions, the results bring into sharper relief the potential of redistribution in achieving this goal.

We present a modified open monocentric city model that assumes that land is available for conversion into new housing throughout the city. The model predicts that positive local income shocks (i) increase the city's share of multi-family housing in new construction and (ii) lead to the construction of smaller units. We exploit the metro area samples of the American Housing Survey from 1984 to 2004 and find support for both predictions. We confirm that the adjustment process is driven by migration and is hindered by strict local land use control. Our findings imply that tight regulation may hamper metro area level labor market adjustment to positive economic shocks not only through limits on the quantity of newly supplied units but also by constraining their type to single-family houses and larger units that may be less suitable for would-be-migrants.

Research for this paper was supported by the Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET) Grant No. INO15-00025. We establish a causal role for banking access in the spread of the Industrial Revolution over the period 1817–1881 by exploiting unique employment data from 10,528 parishes across England and Wales and a novel instrument. We estimate that a one standard deviation increase in 1817 finance employment increases annualized industrial employment growth by 0.93 percentage points. We establish the role of structural transformation as an underlying growth mechanism and show that banking access: (i) increases the industrial employment share; (ii) stimulates urbanization; and (iii) fosters inter-industry transition to high TFP, intermediate and capital-intensive sub-sectors. Postprint

Lao PDR inherited from the Vietnam war the most unexploded ordnance (UXO) contamination per capita in the world. Casualties still amount and even the survivors suffer serious disability. Recently, villagers are seriously injured and disabled by UXO in a village called Phonxay in northern Lao near the Vietnam border. As a small step in devouring causation between the heritage of Vietnam war and the affected people’s livelihood and wellbeing, this short paper aims to identify a causal relationship between UXO impacts and intra-village inter-household trade of locally produced products by using primary data obtained in this UXO-contaminated remote village. The paper identifies that the UXO-affected households give and receive significantly smaller amount of locally-produced commodities to/from others. This negative impact of disability on within-community trade suggests that, in the UXO-affected village it is difficult to expect autonomous cooperation and support for those disabled villagers from others; in other words, they are economically ostracized., This work is partly supported by Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research #16H05704.

Over the past decade the production of tight oil and shale gas significantly increased in the United States. This paper examines how this energy boom has affected regional crime rates throughout the country. We find positive effects on rates of various property and violent crimes in shale-rich counties. In 2013, the cost of the additional crimes in the average treatment county was roughly $2 million. These results are not easily explained by shifts in observed demographics like gender and age. There is however evidence that people with criminal records (registered sex offenders) moved disproportionally to shale-boom towns in North Dakota. We also document a rise in income inequality (a postulated determinant of criminal activity) that coincides with the timing of the energy boom. Policy makers in boom towns should anticipate these crime effects and invest in public infrastructure accordingly.

The US Environmental Protection Agency Brownfields Program awards grants to redevelop contaminated lands known as brownfields. This paper estimates cleanup benefits by combining administrative records for a nationally representative sample of brownfields with high-resolution, high-frequency housing data. With cleanup, we find that property values increase by an average of 5.0% to 11.5%. For a welfare interpretation that does not rely on the intertemporal stability of the hedonic price function, a double-difference matching estimator finds even larger effects of up to 15.2%. Our various specifications lead to the consistent conclusion that Brownfields Program cleanups yield positive, statistically significant, but highly localized effects on housing prices.

本研究は、産業集積論の視点から、中国の製造業における労働生産性成長要因を産業集積変化（同業種集積と異業種集積）、資本労働比率、地域規模に分けて、それぞれ労働生産性成長との関係を地域別に分析した。 その結果、1999年から2007年までの間、中国の製造業の労働生産性は成長したものの、同業種集積と異業種集積による効果はいずれも負の地域が多く、生産性成長分の多くは個々の業種自身によるものであること、資本労働比率による労働生産性成長効果は経済的先進地域ほど小さいこと、地域の規模の拡大が製造業労働生産性成長を促進できることが明らかになった。, This paper analyzed the effects of change in the industrial agglomeration to the growth of labor productivity in the Chinese manufacturing industry, considering the types of industrial composition, capital-labor ratio and scale of agglomeration. We can see such results through the panel data analysis on 29 regions in China between 1999 and 2007 that; both of the same and different types of industry have negative effects to the growth of labor productivity in many regions; the growth of labor productivity owes not a little to the matter of respective businesses; the effects of capital-labor ratio to the growth of labor productivity are decreasing in the advanced regions; scale of agglomeration has a positive correlation with the growth of labor productivity.

Science and Technology Parks (STPs) has become fairly widespread through the world, although their effect on firms' innovation performance is still a very debated issue. A recent stream in the literature points to heterogeneity of tenants and of parks themselves being a key concept when assessing STPs effect on tenants' performance. An important source of STPs heterogeneity that has been disregarded so far is the degree of university involvement in these parks. At the extremes, there are parks that are owned and managed by universities, and parks with no formal links with a university. We use data from the Community Innovation Survey (CIS) for Spain and a survey of STP park managers to analyse how the degree of involvement of a university in the STP is related to innovation outputs of its tenants and their links with universities. We show that higher involvement of a university in the STP is positively related to the number of patent applications, but negatively related to tenant's innovation sales. In addition, we find no robust evidence that higher involvement of a university in the STP is positively related to the propensity for park firms to cooperate with a university or to purchase external R&D services from the university.

O artigo apresenta uma discussão sobre a dinâmica regional e o ordenamento do território brasileiro. Parte-se do princípio de que a região é um conceito que vai além de um recorte no território, refletindo indicadores naturais, sociais e econômicos. A partir dessa premissa, apresenta-se uma reflexão sobre a divisão político-administrativa brasileira e das diferentes formas institucionais de organização. Essa reflexão, associada á análise de indicadores territoriais, leva à discussão sobre as políticas territoriais e sua indissociabilidade das políticas urbanas.

Are knowledge flows all alike? Evidence from European regions. Regional Studies. The paper investigates the impact of distance, contiguity and technological proximity on cross-regional knowledge flows by comparing the evidence concerning co-inventorship, applicant–inventor relationships and citation flows. Evidence is found of significant differences across these diverse kinds of knowledge flows for what concerns the role of distance, and the moderating role of contiguity and technological proximity. Moreover, it is shown that border effects may prove crucial in a twofold sense. On the one hand, contiguity between regions belonging to two different countries still plays a moderating role, although weaker as compared with that of within-country contiguity. On the other hand, regions sharing a frontier with a foreign country are more likely to exchange knowledge with this foreign country than other regions which are far from the border.

This paper focuses on the development of technology clusters and based on this, on two research questions: What are the preconditions for technology cluster development according to cluster research? And, does the region Mainfranken fulfill the requirements for a technology cluster formation? For this purpose, a qualitative study will be conducted by referring to various theoretical concepts of cluster formation. Due to this, the following determinants of cluster development can be deduced into: the traffic infrastructure and infrastructure component, the cluster environment component, the university component, the state component and the industrial component. The analysis of the parameter value of the separate cluster components shows that the core requirements of technology cluster development in the region of Mainfranken are fulfilled. Nevertheless, it is necessary to improve the infrastructure, the commercial and industrial availability of land and availability of capital to form a successful technology cluster. Within the framework of this paper, the potential of technology cluster development in the field of artificial intelligence could also be analyzed., Dieser Beitrag konzentriert sich auf die Entwicklung von Technologieclustern und basiert auf zwei Forschungsfragen: Was sind die Voraussetzungen für die Entwicklung von Technologieclustern gemäß der Clusterforschung? Und erfüllt die Region Mainfranken die Voraussetzungen für eine Technologieclusterbildung? Zu diesem Zweck wird eine qualitative Studie unter Bezugnahme auf verschiedene theoretische Konzepte der Clusterbildung durchgeführt. Aus diesem Grund können die folgenden Determinanten der Clusterentwicklung abgeleitet werden: die Verkehrsinfrastruktur- und Infrastrukturkomponente, die Clusterumfeldkomponente, die Universitätskomponente, die Staatskomponente und die Branchenkomponente. Die Analyse der Parameterwerte der einzelnen Clusterkomponenten zeigt, dass die Kernanforderungen der Technologieclusterentwicklung in der Region Mainfranken erfüllt sind. Dennoch ist es notwendig, die Infrastruktur, die kommerzielle und industrielle Verfügbarkeit von Land und die Verfügbarkeit von Kapital zu verbessern, um ein erfolgreiches Technologiecluster zu bilden. Im Rahmen der vorliegenden Arbeit konnte darüber hinaus das Potenzial der Technologieclusterentwicklung im Bereich der künstlichen Intelligenz analysiert werden.

The economic effect of corruption in Italy: a regional panel analysis, Regional Studies. This paper provides a within-country analysis of the impact of corruption on economic growth using a panel of Italian regions from 1968 to 2011 through a robust measure of corruption. This measure is averaged over five-year periods to reduce short-run fluctuations and probable delayed effects. The results show a significant negative impact of corruption on long-term growth in all specifications, both on average and for each Italian region. As a consequence, a zero level of corruption is growth maximizing. This effect is non-linear such that the negative impact of corruption on growth becomes less intense as corruption increases.

Real estate is an important driver of the Chinese economy, which itself is vital for global growth. However, data limitations make it challenging to evaluate competing claims about the state of Chinese housing markets. This paper brings new data and analysis to the study of supply and demand conditions in nearly three dozen major cities. We first document the most accurate measures of land values, construction costs, and overall house prices. We then create and investigate a number of supply and demand metrics to see if price growth reasonably can be interpreted as reflecting local market fundamentals. Key results include the following: (1) Real house price growth has been high, averaging 10% per annum since 2006. However, there is substantial heterogeneity across markets, ranging from 2.8% (Jinan) to 19.8% (Beijing). House price growth is driven by rising land values, not by construction costs. Real land values have risen by 14.4% per annum on average. In Beijing, the increase has been by a remarkable 27.5% per year (or by 1036%) since 2004. (2) There is variation about the strong positive trend in house price and land value growth. Land values fell by nearly one-third at the beginning of the global financial crisis, but more than fully recovered amidst the 2009–2010 Chinese stimulus. More recent growth has been much more modest, with some markets beginning to decline. Quantities of land sales by local governments to private residential developers have dropped sharply since 2013. The most recent data show transactions volumes down by half or more. This should lead to a reduced supply of new housing units in coming years. (3) Market-level analysis of short- and longer-run changes in supply–demand balances finds important variation across markets. In the major East region markets of Beijing, Hangzhou, Shanghai and Shenzhen which have experienced very high rates of real price growth, we estimate that the growth in households demanding housing units has outpaced new construction since the turn of the century. However, there are thirteen large markets, primarily in the interior of the country, in which new housing production has outpaced household growth by at least 30% and another eleven in which it did so by at least 10%. Regression results show that a one standard deviation increase in local market housing inventory is associated with a 0.45 standard deviation lower rate of real house price growth the following year. (4) There are no official data on residential vacancy rates in China, but some researchers have reported very high figures (17%+). We develop a new series at the provincial level which yields a much lower vacancy rate on average, but it has been rising—from 5.2% in 2009 to 7.8% in 2014. (5) The risk of housing even in markets such as Beijing which show no evidence of oversupply, is best evidenced by price-to-rent ratios. They are well above 50 in the capital city. Poterba's (1984) user cost model suggests these levels can be justified only if owners have sufficiently high expectations of future capital gains. Even a modest one percentage point drop in expected appreciation (or increase in interest rates) would result in a drop in prices of about one-third, absent an offsetting increase in rents.

We construct monthly economic activity indices for the 50 largest U.S. metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) beginning in 1990. Each index is derived from a dynamic factor model based on twelve underlying variables capturing various aspects of metro area economic activity. To accommodate mixed-frequency data and differences in data-publication lags, we estimate the dynamic factor model using a maximum-likelihood approach that allows for arbitrary patterns of missing data. Our indices highlight important similarities and differences in business cycles across MSAs. While a number of MSAs experience sizable recessions during the national recessions of the early 1990s and early 2000s, other MSAs escape recessions altogether during one or both of these periods. Nearly all MSAs suffer relatively deep recessions near the recent Great Recession, but we still find significant differences in the depth of recent metro recessions. We relate the severity of metro recessions to a variety of MSA characteristics and find that MSAs with less-educated populations and less elastic housing supplies experience significantly more severe recessions. After controlling for national economic activity, we also find significant evidence of dynamic spillover effects in economic activity across MSAs.

We present new evidence about the relationship between military conflict and city population growth in Europe from the fall of Charlemagne’s empire to the start of the Industrial Revolution. Military conflict was a main feature of European history. We argue that cities were safe harbors from conflict threats. To test this argument, we construct a novel database that geocodes the locations of 1,091 conflicts and 676 cities between 800 and 1799. We find a significant, positive, and robust relationship that runs from conflict exposure to city population growth. Our analysis suggests that military conflict played a key role in the rise of urban Europe.

Poor domestic transportation infrastructure in developing countries is often cited as an important impediment for accessing international markets. Yet, evidence on how transportation infrastructure improvements affect the volume and composition of exports is scarce. Drawing on the large-scale public investment in expressways undertaken in Turkey during the 2000s, this paper contributes to our understanding of how internal trade costs affect regional exports and specialization. Two results emerge. First, we estimate that this road infrastructure project accounts for 15 percent of the export increase from interior regions, generating a 10-year discounted stream of additional export revenues that amount to between 9 and 14 percent of the value of the investment. Second, while the exports of all industries within a given region increase in response to improvements in connectivity to the international gateways of the country, the magnitude of this increase is larger the more time sensitive an industry is. Accordingly, we also observe an increase in the regional employment and revenue shares of such industries. Our results support the hypothesis that internal trade costs can be a determinant of international specialization and comparative advantage.

Using the location of baroque opera houses as a natural experiment, Falck et al. (2011) claim to document a positive causal effect of the supply of cultural goods on today's regional distribution of talents. This paper raises serious doubts on the validity of the identification strategy underlying these estimates, though. While we are able to replicate the original results, we proceed to show that the same empirical strategy also assigns positive causal effects to the location of historical brothels and breweries. These estimated effects are similar in size and signifi cance to those of historical opera houses. We document that all these estimates reflect the importance of institutions for long-run economic growth, and that the effect of historical amenities on the contemporary local share of high skilled workers disappears upon controlling for regions' historical importance.

The aim of this paper is to explore the relation between the critical knowledge base of firms and how firms respond to incentives embedded in the institutional framework surrounding them. The analysis gives us a better understanding of the complex development of the food sector in Southern Sweden in the past decades. Theoretically, the paper combines concepts of path dependency and knowledge bases, and applies this framework to a set of development trajectories of firms in the Scanian food sector. Three development paths are identified—path extension, path renewal and new path creation. Findings illustrate that these are rooted in different knowledge base combinations of firms, which make them respond differently to similar place- and sector-specific institutional conditions.

We propose the concept of regional alignment to suggest that synergistic relations among the scientific expertise, technological specialization and industry composition of regions affect regional productivity growth. In this paper, we test an extended conditional β-convergence model using data on 94 French departments (NUTS3) for the period 2001-2011. Our results indicate that a conditional β-convergence is associated with a σ-divergence process in the total factor productivity (TFP) growth of French regions. This process is strongly affected by the level of regional alignment. Indeed, we find evidence that regional alignment both directly and indirectly influences regional productivity growth. The indirect effect of regional alignment materializes through its leverage on R&D investment, which is one of the most important drivers of productivity growth. Moreover, using a heterogeneous coefficients model, we show that the positive effect of regional alignment on TFP growth increases with the industrial diversity of regions, which suggests that regional alignment increases the value of Jacobs externalities more than Marshall-ArrowRomer (MAR) externalities. KEY

International audience; This paper analyzes the influence of transportation infrastructure, and in particular of the Regional Express Rail (RER), on employment and population growth in the Paris metropolitan area between 1968 and 2010. In order to make proper causal inference, we rely on historical instruments and control for all other transportation modes that could be complement or substitute to the RER. Our results show that proximity to an RER station increases employment and population density and, in particular, employment and population growth. The latter effects are higher in municipalities located near RER stations and close to employment (sub)centers. They are also found to be particularly strong for jobs in the service sector, for factory workers, and for highly educated population. We find no impact of the RER expansion on employment growth during the first part of the period, while the effect on population growth appears earlier but declines over time.

This paper uses exhaustive individual-level data from the Malian 1976, 1987 and 1998 censuses to analyze the urbanization process and economic specialization of cities in Mali. We first construct an exhaustive panel data set of the 10,000 Malian localities. In order to analyze urban areas that make sense from an economic point of view, we develop a consistent method to construct functional urban agglomerations, based on a density threshold for contiguous localities. Our definition of "cities" therefore abstracts from any administrative criteria. These data enable us to study the dynamics of the complete distribution of urban and rural localities from 1976 to 1998. We show that the urbanization process in Mali is mainly due to the spatial extension and population growth of Bamako, the capital city and to the demographic growth of small rural market towns. Consequently, the density of the Malian urban system is very low and urban primacy very high. We then turn to an econometric analysis of the determinants of non-agricultural employment growth between 1987 and 1998 by locality. We focus on two main factors: population density, which may induce agglomeration externalities that attract workers and firms; and the degree of specialization of economic activities that could capture industry level externalities. Controlling for a range of other characteristics like distance to the road network, administrative status, physical geography, and rainfall shocks, we show that total employment has been spreading out mainly due to the spreading out of primary employment. Primary sector dynamic is impacted by market access. Services and industry jobs cluster in cities and small towns, due mainly to public infrastructure amenities rather than urbanization externalities or sectoral externalities, the latter being not significant and the former significant but weak. _________________________________ A partir de données exhaustives des recensements maliens de la population de 1976, 1987 et 1998, cette étude analyse le processus d’urbanisation et de spécialisation économique des 10 000 localités maliennes. Grâce à un travail d’appariement minutieux, rarement entrepris même dans les pays développés, nous constituons un panel de l’ensemble des localités et nous définissons les agglomérations urbaines en fonction de leurs tailles, densités et contiguïtés. Nous montrons que le Mali est un pays où la concentration des populations s’est opérée prioritairement à Bamako et dans des petits bourgs ruraux et que son tissu urbain est très peu dense. La primatialité du système urbain est alors très élevée. L’analyse de la dynamique de l’emploi révèle que le processus d’urbanisation du Mali s’accompagne plutôt d’un processus de dispersion spatiale des emplois. Cependant, on observe que la croissance des emplois des branches secondaire et tertiaire au sein des villes et des bourgs ruraux de plus de 1 000 habitants dépend positivement de la taille des marchés. Les villes maliennes et leurs concentrations d’habitants permettent donc un dynamisme plus important de l’emploi dans les branches non agricoles. On observe que les zones d’expansion de la culture du coton sont les zones où la croissance démographique des localités est plus forte, sans pour autant que cela occasionne un dynamisme plus important de l’emploi non agricole.

The impact of the economic and financial crisis is still being felt. It started as an acute crisis of the banking system, but then quickly affected the real economy, causing a substantial slump in business investment, household demand and output. The current economic crisis has affected almost all European countries but the countries of the European south and the former eastern socialist republics have suffered the most. The objective in this paper is to quantify economic disparities as expressed by several growth indicators, such as GDP per capita, employment/unemployment rates, labour productivity rates and use them to compare the economic performances before and after the crisis. EU took several measures to recover from the economic crisis. Nevertheless, its ability to adjust to widely diverse national and local contexts that have been impacted differently by the effects of the crisis, and to support the different patterns of economic growth that will result from it, is yet to be seen.

How does economic science inform the study of sustainable development? In his new book, Jeffrey D. Sachs analyzes the challenges of achieving economic growth while protecting the environment and achieving an equitable distribution of resources. This review presents an overview of this ambitious book with special emphasis on the role of the objectives of local and national leaders and their incentives to pursue the sustainability agenda. Given the huge migration to cities now playing out in the developing world, special attention is paid to the role of urbanization as a cause of sustainability opportunities and challenges. (JEL Q01, Q54, Q56, R11)

The recent U.S. house price bubble and the subsequent deep financial crisis have renewed the interest in reliable identification methods for asset price bubbles. While there is a growing number of studies focussing on the detection of U.S. regional bubbles, estimations of the likely starting points in different local U.S. markets are still rare. Using regional data from 1990 to 2010 methods of Statistical Process Control (SPC) are used to test for house price bubbles in 17 major U.S. cities. Based on the EWMA control chart we also present estimations of the likely starting point of the regional bubbles. As a result, we find indications of house price bubbles in all 17 considered cities. Interestingly enough, the recent bubble was not a homogeneous event since regional starting points range from 1996 to 2002.

The energy-related issues have become of paramount importance in recent years due to the exhaustion of fossil fuel resources, their price variations and political dependence on nations with role of energy providers. In addition, the changing in climate conditions requires reduction emissions of greenhouse gases. Therefore, this paper proposes and assesses the novel idea of using constructions as a unit of analysis for corpus-based discourse analysis in the energy field. This article will use a standard method in linguistics to quantitatively investigate academic writings from both a lexical and a stylistic perspective. The present research paper aims to add to the knowledge about energy issues by conducting a data-driven analysis of economic academic discourse, through three periods of time and using secondary data analysis. The findings suggest the evolution of the energy sector throughout time and they gave interesting and different insights into the content of the discourses and enabled better comparison of corpora.

The aim of this study is twofold. First, despite the vast empirical literature on testing the neoclassical model of economic growth using cross-country data, very few studies exist at the sub-national level. We attempt to fill this gap by utilizing panel data over the 2002-2012 period, a modified neoclassical growth equation, and a dynamic panel estimator to investigate the effect of both health and education capital on economic growth and poverty at the district level in Indonesia. Secondly, whilst most existing cross-country studies tend to concentrate only on education as a measure of human capital, we expand the analysis and probe the effects of health capital as well. As far as we are aware, no study has done a direct and comprehensive examination of the impacts of health on growth and poverty at the sub-national level. Thus this study is a premier at the sub-national level, and our findings will be particularly relevant in understanding the role of both health and education capital in accelerating growth and poverty reduction efforts.

The regional development of Romania in 2014-2020 should rely on the lessons learned from the 2007-2013 period. In this wider context, the paper analyses the effects of the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) provided within the 2007-2013 programme focusing on the development of the economic competitiveness, on the large enterprises from the North-East region of Romania. Three hypotheses are tested within this empirical research. First, that the EU financial assistance granted to a large enterprise implies an increase in its net turnover, gross profit and number of staff. Second, we aim to see whether the increase in the net turnover, gross profit and number of staff is directly linked to the increase of the ERDF grant. Finally, we analyse if the increase of the three indicators is higher for the large enterprises that implemented more projects than for the enterprises that implemented a single project. The analysis also puts under discussion the quality and the availability of the information concerning the projects funded by the European Union in Romania, taking also into consideration the 2014-2020 e-cohesion requirement.

The rural-urban fringe area of Bucharest is the most economically dynamic region of Romania, and, at the same time, is the one, which suffered the most from the recent economic decline. The article is focused on the analysis of inequalities of social-economic variables, including differences in their spatial patterns, before and after the 2008 economic crisis. We involved two methods of inequality analysis. Gini coefficient was used to determine the overall level of inequalities in the region. Comparison with the region’s mean value was used for identification of spatial patterns of these inequalities. Our results highlight four trends in the overall level of inequality dynamics, while all the studied variables follow more or less accurately the same pattern of spatial dynamics. Our findings provide new arguments in support of the idea that the new processes in the Bucharest fringe zone follow the circular pattern, which privileges the northern part of the area, while south is the last to benefit from any new development.

Agriculture may support the local nonagricultural economy in rural areas, though agricultural expansion may also crowd-out nonagricultural activity. On the United States Plains, areas over the Ogallala aquifer experienced windfall agricultural gains when post-WWII technologies increased farmers' access to groundwater. Comparing counties over the Ogallala with similar counties, nonagricultural sectors experienced only short-run relative benefits. Despite substantial and persistent agricultural gains, there was no long-run relative expansion of nonagricultural sectors in Ogallala counties. Agricultural development may still encourage regional or national nonagricultural development, but agriculture does not appear to generate local economic spillovers that differentially encourage local nonagricultural activity. (JEL Q12, Q15, Q18, Q25, R11)

In contrast with the nominal convergence, the real convergence in the process of accession to the European Single market is a complex process and still not clarified enough from the methodology point of view. The convergence process became increasingly important for the EU since Euro was adopted. The single European market and the Economic and Monetary Union generated - in an objective and necessary way - a high interdependence among the national economies, and, in the same time, new qualitative, competitive and economic performing requirements for each and every member state. Essentially, the real convergence reflects the interdependence among the uniqueness of the European market and the specificity of the national markets, and, as a consequence, with no space left for identifying rules and indicators that could reflect the way the national economies harmonize in order to systemically form another economy – the European economy.

This study investigates the effects of taxes and public investment on economic growth of Mexican states. The subnational government finance data were drawn from 32 states during the period of 1993 to 2011. Correcting for long-term trends and isolating cointegration effects between economic growth and public finance, the empirical results indicate that taxes have negative effect on growth and the effect can be seen in both transitory and permanent manners. As predicted by growth theory, the effects of public investment on subnational growth are statistically significant and positive in both short and long-runs. On the other hand, we find that educational accomplishment positively relates to growth; but only in the long-run. Foreign direct investment does not have any significant effect on subnational economic growth. In general, the results imply that an appropriate fiscal policy (equilibrium between public investment and taxes) is required to boost economic growth in this country.

The paper studies the role of incentives provided by local government units (LGUs) in attracting foreign direct investment (FDI) to Poland’s Lodz province. The authors draw conclusions based on the results of a direct study using two types of questionnaires, one for foreign investors in the province and the other for LGUs. To ensure the accuracy of the study, the authors conducted an array of statistical surveys and tests. The eta correlation coefficient was among the most important measures, the authors say. It was used to assess the relationship between the inflow of FDI to Lodz province and the investment incentives offered by local government. The method helped verify a hypothesis concerning the significance of statistical relationships between the analyzed variables. The obtained results demonstrate that most LGUs were interested in attracting investors, both Polish and foreign, the authors note. Incentives targeted exclusively at foreign investors were rare, according to the authors. Financial incentives were offered by only 7% of the districts and counties. Tax relief and allowances in property fees and local charges were the most popular types of financial incentives. Many LGUs resorted to various promotional methods. The results of the study show that investment incentives were of secondary importance to the inflow of FDI to Lodz province, the authors conclude. Nor was this kind of support a key factor behind the decisions of foreign investors to continue operating in the region.

Die amtliche Statistik hat die Angaben zum Bruttoinlandsprodukt der ostdeutschen Flächenländer für die Jahre seit 2000 um jährlich rund 3% erhöht. In dieser Korrektur kommen auch konzeptionelle Erweiterungen des gesamtwirtschaftlichen Rechnungswesens zum Tragen. Insbesondere betrifft das Forschungs- und Entwicklungsleistungen, die jetzt wie eine Investition in ein Vermögensgut behandelt werden. Es zeigt sich, dass der Osten in diesem Zukunftsbereich gegenüber dem Westen stärker zurückliegt, als bisher beziffert worden ist.

Regional development policies became a current issue within a totally new scope with the increasing importance of local activities by the 1990s. During this period, states having a national perspective on development were replaced by 'regional development agencies' within the framework of newly emerging understanding of ‘governance’. Regional development policies in Turkey were transformed from centralization to decentralization with the process of membership to the European Union. The “Development Agencies” emerging from this process were established in 26 Level 2 Regions in Turkey, starting from 2006. In this context, this study is designed to examine the activities of Development Agencies, established within 26 Level 2 Regions in Turkey, based on their activity reports, and to identify the compliance of these activities with tasks and responsibilities of the Agencies. This study uses the ‘Call for Proposals’ mechanism as an activity of the agencies.

The article generalizes the factors influencing the formation of socio-economic development of rural areas and the development of the concept of such development. Some aspects of state regulation of social and economic development of rural areas and directions of forming regional systems of Rural Development. Systematized scientific approaches and the concept of rural development and the degree of differentiation of rural areas by various signs. Carried out SWOT analysis of strengths and weaknesses, opportunities and threats for social and economic development of rural areas in the present conditions. Grounded the measures on the use of innovation activities in accelerating socio-economic development of rural areas, and proposed the concept of socio-economic development of rural areas, based on the accounting functions of rural areas in particular: residential, economic, industrial, recreational, accommodation, environmental, resource.

The economic fortunes of port-cities have evolved over time. Ports have been drivers of trade-related economic wealth in the past, but current economic benefits to their cities are more ambiguous. Port-cities and their evo-lutions have been categorised in various ways. This article aims to assess the applicability of these typologies by confronting two port-cities in the Mediter-ranean of similar size and similar dominance of port functions: Marseille in France and Mersin in Turkey. After an analysis of the different port develop-ment trajectories, the article assesses the economic impact of these two ports. Following a similar methodology, it provides calculations of port-related em-ployment, value added and inter-regional spill-overs. It compares the economic trajectories and possible future development paths. By confronting these differ-ent trajectories, the article attempts to assess the applicability of generic port-city typologies and models of port-city evolutions.

The article provides a review of international experience in the fi eld of electricity markets integration in Central American countries and European Power Exchange SPOT zone. The revision of earlier results for Nord Pool, North American Free Trade Agreement and MERCOSUR is given. Conclusions about common positive and negative factors affecting the process of integration are derived.

The dramatic increase in oil and gas production from shale formations has led to an intense interest in its impact on local area economies. Exploration, drilling and extraction are associated with direct increases in employment and income in the energy industry, but little is known about the impacts on other parts of local economies. Increased energy sector employment and income can have positive spillover effects through increased purchases of intermediate goods and induced local spending. Negative spillover effects can occur through rising local factor and goods prices and adverse effects on the local area quality of life. Therefore, this paper examines the net economic impacts of oil and gas production from shale formations for key shale oil and gas producing areas in Arkansas, North Dakota and Pennsylvania. The synthetic control method (Abadie and Gardeazabal, 2003; Abadie et al., 2010) is used to establish a baseline projection for the local economies in the absence of increased energy development, allowing for estimation of the net regional economic effects of increased shale oil and gas production.

Zur Mitte des Jahres 2015 hat sich die Dynamik am sächsischen und am ostdeutschen Arbeitsmarkt abgeschwächt. Sowohl die Beschäftigung als auch die Arbeitslosenquote stagnierten saisonbereinigt auf ihren Frühjahrsniveaus. Auch für die kommenden Monate deuten die Frühindikatoren auf eine eher gedämpfte Dynamik am sächsischen und ostdeutschen Arbeitsmarkt hin.

The aim of this article was to define, quantify and compare the significant attributes of business risk for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the selected regions of Slovakia. The data was collected through a questionnaire. The whole research was conducted in the Bratislava region on a sample of 102 SMEs, in the region of Trencin on a sample of 105 SMEs and in the Zilina region on a sample of 168 SMEs. Thus we compared important factors of business risk in the most economically developed region of the Slovak capital to the average regions of Trencin and Zilina. On the basis of the results of our research, we can conclude that the most important business risk is market risk in all regions. The average value of perceived market risk was higher than 50%. For this reason entrepreneurs have indicated the existence of negative trends in performance and profitability of their companies.

Accelerating industrialization increased negative consequences related with resources and ecosystem which in turn increased importance of sustainable development strategies depending on regional dynamicsand local resources. Slow City (Cittaslow) movement serves a collaborative sustainable development model that focuses on both protection of local values and local economy including all stakeholders in the process while supporting social transformations in its own global local network. This study examines the changes in Seferihisar’s – Slow capital city of Turkey – local economy after the membership of Slow City movement in terms of economic and social changes. In this study, purposive sampling was used and the data was collected with interview method from the team of Seferihisar Municipality which actively engaged in Cittaslow activities. The data was analyzed with content analysis method. At the end of the study, it was found that Seferihisar’s local economy is changed in domains of status in global network, local production and consumption and social situation. The unique value of this study is discussing about negative aspects of changes which are not elaborated before and interaction between economic and social transformations.

The authors wonted to demonstrated the management of Istrian touristic management resources emphasizing current conditions and development prospects. The main idea was an hypothesis: if the touristic management and the resources management is organized and strategicly planned, positive synergy effects can be expected in each level of touristic management, and through the years,the positive impact to all destination will be a fact. That is also truth for Istrian undeveloped areas, such as middle istrian villages. Although Istria boasts reputation of a region with positive potentials, one must emphasize there are still undeveloped areas, a high number of uneducated population, shortage of staff in educational institutions, all which requires a more professional approach to the issue of management. Middle istrian villages can also become an interesting touristic micro – destinations. This research, first of its kind int he County of Istria, has attempted to gain a realistic insight into the condition oft he Istrian County territory. The research has been conducted by means oft he Delphy method in two intervals, the theory analysis method, observation and intervju on a sample consisting of 34 local self – government units (municipalities and cities). Questions were replied by heads and municipal prefects of local self – government units and others in charge of management. The research objective was to determine the type of help and who provided it as well as the type of management required for a more quality development and touristic management. Though the Istrian region has been recognized as a quality tourist destination for years, its possibility for a bigger and better step forward must be pointed out in terms of managing the destination itself. To achieve optimal solutions, professional management modules and innovative guidelines set by tourism trends and new european programmes must be followed in order to adjust them to destination needs and requirements.

This paper shows an analysis of tourism activity in the Mexican Republic States, where the most visited tourism destinations are located. The intention is to identify the economic structure related to tourism activity, employment specialization and the productivity index. We used the tourist statistics derivative from the Mexican Economic Census (2003 and 2008) and estimated a Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), the Normalized Employment Specialization Index and the Employment Coefficient, for nine Mexican States where tourist employment is more than 20% of total employment and for each section of the tourism sector, according to the North America Industry Classification System (NAICS). The results show a heterogeneous behavior in the establishments, employment and characteristics of the tourism sector. These results contribute to design of the promotional and development public policies for tourism.

Cities are one of the most important key in regional development. Creative and innovative cities are considered a competitive pole, by stimulating economic activities and inclusive growth. Those cities which understood the implications for sustainable development are prosperous and competitive at a global level, for example Silicon Valley which is well known as the city were Apple Industry started. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the best practice of creative and innovative cities at global level and extract the most important aspects, which could be applied on Romanian cities. In Romania, there are few cities which may be included in this category, as smart cities. In order to improve the existing literature, this paper aims to explain the benefits of stimulating the cities development and elaborate a list of recommendations for Romanian authorities.

Purpose: The main objective of this paper is to analyze the recent past trends and patterns of urbanization, urban economic growth, and urban equity measured by urban poverty and inequality in India. Methodology: In addition, it reviews the different urban development policies and programme which are undertaken in different Plan Periods in India. Findings: The analysis shows that higher rate of urbanization is associated with higher economic growth, lower level of poverty and higher extent of inequality in urban India. Recommendations: The findings suggest that Indian government needs to speed up the urbanization rate as it contributes higher share of national GDP by reducing urban poverty and inequality.