Top lights: Bright cities and their contribution to economic development

Richard Bluhm and Melanie Krause

Journal of Development Economics, 2022, vol. 157, issue C

Abstract: Tracking the development of cities in emerging economies is difficult with conventional data. This paper shows that nighttime lights can be used as a reliable proxy for economic activity at the city level, provided they are first corrected for top-coding. The commonly-used satellite images of nighttime light intensity fail to capture the true brightness of larger cities. We present a stylized model of urban luminosity and empirical evidence which both suggest that these ‘top lights’ can be characterized by a Pareto distribution or similarly heavy-tailed distributions. We then propose a correction procedure that recovers the full distribution of city lights. Our results show that the brightest cities account for nearly a third of global light output. Applying this approach to cities in Sub-Saharan Africa, we find that primate cities are outgrowing secondary cities. Contrary to the top-coded data, our data show that differences at the intensive margin drive the differential in relative growth rates across city types.

Keywords: Development; Urban growth; Night lights; Top-coding; Inequality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O10 O18 R11 R12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (20)

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Related works:
Working Paper: Top Lights: Bright cities and their contribution to economic development (2020)
Working Paper: Top Lights - Bright Cities and their Contribution to Economic Development (2018)
Working Paper: Top Lights: Bright cities and their contribution to economic development (2018)
Working Paper: Top Lights - Bright Spots and their Contribution to Economic Development (2016)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:deveco:v:157:y:2022:i:c:s0304387822000487

DOI: 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2022.102880

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