The new economic geography versus urban economics: an evaluation using local wage rates in Great Britain

Bernard Fingleton ()

ERSA conference papers from European Regional Science Association

Abstract: This paper tests two competing models, one deriving from new economic geography theory (NEG) emphasising varying market potential, the other with a basis in urban economics theory (UE) in which the main emphasis is on producer service linkages. Using wage rate variations across small regions of Great Britain, the paper finds that, taking commuting into account, it is UE theory rather than NEG theory that has explanatory power. However since the two hypotheses are non-nested, the evaluation of the competing hypotheses is difficult and therefore the conclusions are provisional. Nevertheless this paper provides evidence that we should be cautious about the ability of NEG to work at all levels of spatial resolution, and re-emphasises the need to focus on supply-side variations in producer services inputs and labour efficiency variations, including the role of commuting, in local economic analysis.

Date: 2004-08
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-geo, nep-hpe and nep-ure
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www-sre.wu.ac.at/ersa/ersaconfs/ersa04/PDF/638.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: The new economic geography versus urban economics: an evaluation using local wage rates in Great Britain (2006)
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:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa04p638

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in ERSA conference papers from European Regional Science Association Welthandelsplatz 1, 1020 Vienna, Austria.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Gunther Maier ().