 The Gains from Reshaping Infrastructure: Evidence from the division of GermanyMarta Santamaria No 1909, CEPREMAP Working Papers (Docweb) from CEPREMAP Abstract: This paper quantifies the gains from infrastructure investments and shows that reshaping the highway network after a large economic shock, the division of Germany, had positive welfare and income effects. To address the endogeneity between infrastructure and economic outcomes, I develop a multi-region quantitative trade model where infrastructure is chosen by the government to maximise welfare. I calibrate the model to the prewar German economy and estimate the key structural parameter of the model using the prewar Highway Plan. I exploit the division of Germany, a large-scale exogenous shock to economic fundamentals, to show that the model can predict changes in highway construction after the division. Using newly collected data, I document that half of the new highway investments deviated from the prewar Highway Plan. I find that the reallocation of these investments (one-third of the network) increased real income by 0.6\% to 2\% each year, compared to the construction of the original prewar Plan. Finally, I find a large cost of path-dependence: the ability to reshape the full network in anticipation of the division could have increased real income by an additional 1.5\%. Keywords: Transport Infrastructure; Economic geography; Economic history; Germany (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cpm:docweb:1909 Access Statistics for this paper More papers in CEPREMAP Working Papers (Docweb) from CEPREMAP Contact information at EDIRC. |
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