Night lights and regional GDP

Frank Bickenbach, Eckhardt Bode, Mareike Lange and Peter Nunnenkamp

No 1888, Kiel Working Papers from Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel)

Abstract: Night lights could be a valuable proxy of economic activity at the subnational level when GDP data are lacking or of poor quality. Supplementing Henderson et al.'s (2012) analysis at the national level, we assess the stability of the elasticity of GDP with regard to night lights across regions in Brazil, India, the United States, and Western Europe. The relationship between regional GDP and night lights proves to be unstable, not only where regional GDP data may be unreliable but also where such data are of high quality. This suggests that night lights tend to be a poor proxy of regional economic activity.

Keywords: night lights; regional GDP data; stability of lights elasticities; emerging markets; developed economies (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E01 R11 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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Related works:
Journal Article: Night lights and regional GDP (2016)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:ifwkwp:1888

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