Spatial Frictions

Kristian Behrens (), Giordano Mion, Yasusada Murata and Jens Suedekum

No 7175, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: The world is replete with spatial frictions. Shipping goods across cities entails trade frictions. Commuting within cities causes urban frictions. How important are these frictions in shaping the spatial economy? We develop and quantify a novel framework to address this question at three different levels: Do spatial frictions matter for the city-size distribution? Do they affect individual city sizes? Do they contribute to the productivity advantage of large cities and the toughness of competition in cities? The short answers are: no; yes; and it depends.

Keywords: city-size distribution; urban frictions; trade frictions; productivity; markups (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F12 R12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 64 pages
Date: 2013-01
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 (12)

Published - published in: Journal of Urban Economics, 2017, 97(1), 40-70.

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https://docs.iza.org/dp7175.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Spatial frictions (2017)
Working Paper: Spatial frictions (2014)
Working Paper: Spatial Frictions (2011)
Working Paper: Spatial frictions (2011)
Working Paper: Spatial frictions (2011)
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