The Geography of Research: The Trade-Off Between Knowledge Production and Access

Sitian Liu and Yichen Su

Papers from arXiv.org

Abstract: Research activity generates highly localized positive spillovers, yet in the U.S. it has become increasingly spatially misaligned with population and economic activity as people moved away from legacy cities where major research institutions remain anchored. Reallocating researchers toward population centers could broaden local access to knowledge but may reduce knowledge production if legacy institutions or large research clusters raise researcher output. The spatial reallocation of researchers therefore entails a trade-off between gains in knowledge access and losses in knowledge production. To quantify the knowledge production loss from reallocation, we use bibliographic data to separate individual effects from location effects and show that location effects account for substantial differences in research output across locations. Our instrumental-variables estimates provide robust evidence of own-institution agglomeration effects but weaker evidence of external-cluster effects. We then incorporate these estimates into counterfactual reallocations and show that marginally reallocating researchers toward large metropolitan areas with relatively little research activity can plausibly raise aggregate output because the associated knowledge production losses are modest and can be offset by small access gains.

Date: 2026-08
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