The Effect of Information and Communication Technologies on Urban Structure

Yannis Ioannides, Henry Overman, Esteban Rossi-Hansberg and Kurt Schmidheiny

No 2049, CESifo Working Paper Series from CESifo

Abstract: Two innovations in the last century have changed dramatically the cost of communicating and transmitting information: The first is the widespread adoption of telephony; the second is the internet. We study the implications of these changes in ICT for urban structure. We find robust evidence that increases in the number of telephone lines per capita lead to a more concentrated distribution of city sizes and so correspondingly to more dispersion in the distribution of economic activity in space. The evidence on internet usage is more speculative, although it goes in the same direction. This empirical result is rationalized in a theoretical model.

Date: 2007
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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Related works:
Journal Article: The effect of information and communication technologies on urban structure (2008)
Working Paper: The Effect of Information and Communication Technologies on Urban Structure (2007)
Working Paper: The effect of information and communication technologies on urban structure (2007)
Working Paper: The Effect of Information and Communication Technologies on Urban Structure (2007)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ces:ceswps:_2049

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