People, places and firms: improving our understanding of wage and productivity disparities

Yadira Gomez Hernandez and Henry G. Overman

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: In many countries spatial disparities in wages and productivity are large and persistent. This raises questions about the causes and consequences of such disparities. Two inter-related issues – the sorting of high skilled workers and the productivity benefits of urban density – are central to the way in which urban economists have approached these questions. In this commentary, we argue that despite the emerging consensus that sorting matters for wage disparities, the literature has made less progress on other dimensions of these disparities and a number of methodological issues remain unresolved.

Keywords: agglomeration economies; wage disparities; sorting (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J31 J61 R23 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026-10-29
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Published in Journal of Economic Geography, 29, October, 2026. ISSN: 1468-2702

Downloads: (external link)
https://researchonline.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/141465/ Open access version. (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ehl:lserod:141465

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library LSE Library Portugal Street London, WC2A 2HD, U.K.. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by LSERO Manager ().