Sprawl and Blight

Jan Brueckner and Robert Helsley ()
Additional contact information
Robert Helsley: Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley

No 91003, Working Papers from University of California-Irvine, Department of Economics

Abstract: The objective of this paper is to show how the same market failures that contribute to urban sprawl also contribute to urban blight. The paper develops a simple dynamic model in which new suburban and older central-city properties compete for mobile residents. The level of housing services generated by older properties depends on current maintenance or reinvestment expenditures. In this setting, market failures that reduce the cost of occupying suburban locations, thus leading to excessive suburban development, also depress central-city housing prices and undermine maintenance incentives, leading to deficient levels of central-city reinvestment. Corrective policies that shift population from the suburbs to the center result in higher levels of reinvestment in central-city housing, therefore reducing blight.

Keywords: Urban sprawl; Urban blight; Market failures (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: R00 R51 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 28 pages
Date: 2009-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-geo and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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https://www.economics.uci.edu/files/docs/workingpapers/2009-10/brueckner-3.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Sprawl and blight (2011)
Working Paper: Sprawl and Blight (2009)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:irv:wpaper:091003

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