Turnout,political strength,and cost efficiency in Spanish municipalities of the autonomous region of Galicia: Evidence from an alternative stochastic frontier approach

The scientific literature has used different theoretical arguments and methodological alternatives to attempt to demonstrate whether both electoral turnout and the strength of the incumbent majority influence the cost efficiency of municipal governments, reaching inconclusive results. We provide new arguments and employ a methodology that overcomes some of the limitations of the previous studies. Our research confirms a direct association between electoral turnout and municipal cost efficiency in the Spanish region of Galicia. Moreover, the strength of the incumbent majority has a significant negative effect on cost efficiency, contradicting the frequently used explanations that are based on government inaction or the common-pool problem.     

On the performance of creative industries: Evidence from Mexican metropolitan areas

This paper evaluates the performance of creative industries in 56 Mexican metropolitan areas over the period 1998−2013. Derived from Florida's 3T theory, determinants of inefficiency are examined by focusing on metropolitan area-related variables. The analysis yields several interesting findings. First, there is a marked heterogeneity in performance, especially within the arts creative sector. Second, there is relatively little robust evidence that inefficiency can be reduced by increments in public investment (technology), “creative students” (talent) or cultural opportunity (tolerance). Thereby the role of local governments developing and implementing differentiated policy strategies could contribute to increase the efficiency of the creative sector.     

Inter-regional networks and productive efficiency in Japan

Traditional agglomeration theories cannot explain Japan's sustained reduction of regional disparities. This study employs stochastic frontier analysis to investigate the role of inter-regional networks in improving productive efficiency using the concept of “borrowed size.” Improved inter-regional networks are a driving force for strengthening local economies and converging regional disparities. Borrowed size from large city agglomeration was highly effective in local areas. The development of transportation networks has enabled local areas to catch up to large metropolitan areas. The results suggest that the development of high-speed transportation networks can help to reduce regional disparities in the Japanese economy.     

Economic crisis and regional resilience: Evidence from Greece

Shift‐share and input‐output models are combined to explore the resilience of Greek regions to economic crisis. Model results indicate that rural regions are more resistant to recessionary shocks than urban regions. The analysis of the space‐specific ability of sectors to withstand economic shocks portrayed the resilience of agriculture, while food industry, although its impact overtime declined, managed to increase its employment in seven out of thirteen regions. The tourism sector contracted but showed more resilience in the island regions than in the continental regions. The spatial heterogeneity in the effects of the recessionary shocks re‐emphasizes the need for targeted and differentiated regional development policies.     

Comparing Rural and Urban Social and Economic Behavior in Uganda: Insights from Mobile Voice Service Usage

Abstract

The analysis of Call Detail Record (CDR) data sets generated by mobile telephony networks has generated much interest in recent years, particularly as an easily accessed source of large volumes of data capable of reflecting the dynamic behavior of humans across a range of temporal and spatial scales. This paper presents a study focused on examining human social and economic behavioral patterns in Uganda through the analysis of a CDR data set generated in a Ugandan mobile telephone network in 2010. By examining the response of subscribers to a service incentivizing higher mobile phone call rates through the offering of discounts, economically motivated differences in subscriber behavior in poorer versus wealthier regions of the country are identified. The paper also presents an analysis which suggests a high degree of social insularity within the regions of Uganda which is most likely related to regionally economic development levels in addition to the high levels of ethnic homogeneity within those regions. A methodology for identifying centers of economic activity using the data set alone is also presented and the accuracy and implications of the resultant regional patterns are discussed. Finally, measures of human mobility, and its relationship with economic and social regional characteristics, are examined through the use of graph theoretic based analysis techniques.     

Quality of government and regional resilience in the European Union. Evidence from the Great Recession

This paper examines the relationship between quality of government and regional resilience in the European Union during the Great Recession. The results show that the quality of government is an important factor when shaping the regional reaction to the crisis. Our estimates reveal that higher quality of government is associated with greater regional resilience over the Great Recession. This is partly due to the role played in this context by spatial spillovers induced by the quality of government in neighbouring regions. The observed link between governance and regional resilience is robust to the inclusion in the analysis of different explanatory variables that may affect both government quality and regional resilience. Likewise, our findings do not depend on the specific dimension of governance considered, the estimation method or the econometric specification employed to capture the nature of spatial spillovers.     

Implementation of European Cohesion Policy at the sub-national level: Evidence from beneficiary data in Eastern Germany

Regional governments’ discretion in allocating structural funds is limited by the competences of the European Commission to control fiscal activities of decentralized governments. Regional political behaviour and the complexity of the implementation process shape the policy outcome. Who benefits from structural funds? In this paper, we analyse implementation of ERDF funds in East Germany in the financial perspective 2007 to 2013. We find that less rural regions and some economic sectors benefit by more than others. A few beneficiaries control the highest share of the funds. The Gini coefficients vary by group of actor and show high inequality in the distribution of the funds. This indicates that a few actors have better access to the funds than others.     

Crime and regional economic growth in Mexico: A spatial perspective

The aim of this paper is to examine the effects of crime on regional economic growth in Mexico. We estimate a growth model using a spatial panel data model and test for the presence and type of spatial interaction, as proposed by Elhorst. Our results suggest that a two‐way spatial Durbin model best fits the data, crime exerts a negative total effect on economic growth across Mexican states, particularly homicides and robbery, and significant spillover effects seem to reinforce the negative impact on regional growth.     

Scalable shift-share analysis: Novel framework and application to France

The shift-share analysis (SSA) of regional employment growth disparities aims at disentangling the effects of regional differences in industry mix and industrial competitiveness. Yet, the spatial concentration of industry is a blindspot of this approach. We generalize the SSA to encompass this salient feature of the economic geography. Besides, industry emergence and catastrophic growth events—booming or collapsing industries—are integrated in our framework. This novel method is applied to study regional disparities in manufacturing employment growth in France in a dynamic way over a 22-year period at a fine geographical level.     

Historical and current spatial differences in female labour force participation: Evidence from Germany

Female labour force participation (FLFP) increased significantly in the 20th century. Nevertheless, there are persisting spatial differences in FLFP. Using data from Germany, this paper demonstrates that regional differences in the degree of industrialization in the 1920s explain spatial variation in FLFP at that time and almost 100 years later. The latter finding is not explained by persisting industry structures. Additionally, there is evidence that regions with historically high FLFP have a higher social acceptance of working women. Together these results suggest that policies to increase FLFP should account for the historical context of each region.     

The relationship between output and unemployment: Evidence from Greek regions

This research note investigates the relationship between output and unemployment in Greece at a regional level through the implementation of Okunss law. Current practice is primarily restricted to the national level, and thus ignores the regional dimension of this relationship. To this end, we apply modern unit root test and cointegration techniques based on panel data settings. Using panel data is necessary because typical spans of economic time series are short, so the entire panel must be exploited in order to draw sharper inferences. The empirical results reveal that Okuns law can be confirmed for six out of the 13 regions we examine.Received: 20 November 2002, Accepted: 5 November 2003, JEL Classification: C23, E32, O18Dimitris K. Christopoulos: I would like to thank two anonymous referees and the European editor, whose comments greatly strengthened the notes content. Thanks are also extended to Dr. V. Arapoglou for helpful suggestions on an earlier version. The usual disclaimer applies     

The two faces of R&D and human capital: Evidence from Western European regions

This paper investigates two channels through which R&D and human capital may affect regional total factor productivity growth in the manufacturing sector. Our model allows for both a direct effect on productivity growth, reflecting own innovation, and an indirect effect, reflecting imitation of frontier technology. The results provide evidence of a positive and significant direct effect of human capital, and a positive and significant indirect effect of R&D. Our estimates also suggest that R&D aids the imitation of technology from geographically close regions, while human capital raises productivity growth in regions that are closer to the frontier than their neighbours.     

E-Capital and Economic Growth in European Metropolitan Areas: Applying Social Media Messaging in Technology-Based Urban Analysis

ABSTRACT

Innovation is an elemental part of regional economic growth. In the past years, information and communication technologies (ICTs) have enabled new means for data collection, and analysis for the study of regional innovation systems. This paper investigates innovation and technology messaging in Twitter, which has been described as the SMS of the Internet. The concept of electronic capital (e-capital) is applied in order to find out how technology messaging relates to the economic situation in metropolitan areas. The recently introduced concept of e-capital is cultivated from the conceptualizations of innovation acknowledging that different forms of capital, including human, social, and economic, circulate and have an effect on each other. The analysis indicates that clusters of e-capital and potential growth clusters are identifiable by using Twitter activity. In Europe, e-capital agglomerates to previously identified clusters of the “Blue Banana” and the “Golden Banana” (or the “Sun Belt”). Based on spatial statistics, we apply Categories of Metropolitan Areas (COMAs) in order to classify Twitter intensive locations across Europe. We defined four COMAs and estimated their e-capital potential. The most problematic COMA lies in Eastern Europe whereas the strongest concentration is found in Western Europe.     

Effects of dynamic and spatial externalities on local growth: Evidence from Brazil

This paper analyses the impact of economic externalities on the local growth emphasizing the industrial, geographic, and temporal scope of agglomeration economies. Thus, we estimated a spatial dynamic panel model using GMM associated with the use of data at different levels of sectoral aggregation. Estimation takes into account the endogeneity of agglomeration economies. Our database consists of 558 Brazilian regions for 1995–2015. The main results suggest that while externalities act in a local dimension they also have a regional scale. These externalities are determined by their temporal trajectory. The effects of agglomeration economies on local growth are sensitive to the choice of sectoral aggregation. Local growth exhibits positive specialization effects and negative diversity effects. However, greater industrial diversity of neighbouring regions has a positive impact on local growth.     

Housing Reconstruction as Socio-economic Recovery and State Building: Evidence from Southern Lebanon

In the aftermath of the 2006 ‘July War’ housing reconstruction in southern Lebanon proceeded along an owner-driven model funded primarily by Middle Eastern donors. This paper addresses the previously unexamined nature of this process, including the actors involved, amounts provided and the results achieved, before examining the ways in which implementation affected economic development, poverty alleviation, gender equity, disaster preparedness, cultural heritage and state building. As consistently identified within the literature, housing reconstruction following conflict and other crises has implications beyond the provision of permanent shelter, such as for health and psychosocial well-being. Emerging (or re-emerging) owner-driven approaches as applied in southern Lebanon, while possessing theoretical benefits, were found to have varied effects upon populations at differing socio-economic statuses. Mixed or hybrid approaches combining owner-driven and contractor-driven models may help to capitalise upon the strengths of each, such as local ownership and structural integrity, while ensuring a greater degree of flexibility than either is able to provide independently.     

Spatio-temporal evolution of regional inequality and contribution decomposition of economic growth: A case study of Jiangsu Province,China

Regional inequality in the process of economic growth has recently been a popular topic. This paper creatively proposes contribution decomposition methods to divide various regions' contributions into economic contribution and population contribution. The methods consider not only economic growth but also population change, which may be more effective than the traditional method that uses the per capita GDP (gross domestic product) as its single measurement indicator. Moreover, the objective is to take a step forward and reveal the spatio-temporal evolution characteristics of regional disparities by integrating barycentre model and economic development equilibrium model. Lastly, the applicability of the research method proposed in this paper is verified by a case study of Jiangsu province, China; the results show a new regional economic pattern in Jiangsu province.     

Localised knowledge,local policies and regional innovation activity for renewable energy technologies: Evidence from Italy

This paper investigates the mechanism of locally induced innovation activities in the field of renewable energy technologies (RET). A panel data analysis from 1998 to 2007 across 20 Italian regions identifies the primary drivers of renewable energy patenting activity. As expected, the localised stock of knowledge, local researchers and regional public research subsidies contribute significantly to the development of innovation activities. Additionally, regional characteristics, such as regional energy dependence and hydroelectric resources, are effective in determining the RET innovation patterns. Specifically, regional hydroelectric power acts as a substitute input and hence hampers the innovation activities in the field of RET. Finally, RET innovation activities depend to a limited extent on the political orientation of regional councils, thereby confirming prior research on the role of social acceptance of and political support for technology development. Highlighting the role of local resources and local policies for RET innovation activities, the present research has potential implications for economies that strive to become more self‐reliant and less import intensive in the knowledge sector.     

(Un)bundling infrastructure procurement: Evidence from water supply and sewage projects

Public infrastructure has long been faced with difficulty in financing. Available public resources are often limited in many countries. Competitive bidding in public procurement systems is an important instrument to contain the public investment costs. But competition is often limited in the infrastructure sector. In such circumstances, better public procurement design can save a lot of public resources. There is a general tradeoff between the competition effect and economies of scale and scope; large contracts can benefit from the scale and scope effects but have to compromise competition. The unbundling approach can foster competition but may suffer from diseconomies of scale and scope. Using procurement data from water supply and sewage projects in developing countries, the paper analyzes the effects of the (un)bundling strategy on bidders’ entry and bidding behavior. It shows that the bidder cost structure exhibits significant diseconomies of scope between two main public works in this sector, i.e., treatment plant construction and distribution network installation. There is no clear evidence of the competition effect. Therefore, there is no rationale of bundling these two works into a single contract. Unbundling can help governments to contain public infrastructure costs.     

Self‐employment and local economic performance: Evidence from US counties*

This study explores the relationship between self‐employment and income growth, employment growth, and change in poverty in metro and non‐metro areas in the United States using county‐level panel data. We investigate the impact of the relative size of the self‐employment sector measured by the share of non‐farm proprietorships (NFPs) in total full and part‐time employment on three key economic performance indicators. We first estimate an income growth model to analyse the effects of self‐employment on income growth. Then we investigate the independent effects of self‐employment on employment growth and changes in family poverty rates. Our results indicate that higher self‐employment rates are associated with statistically significant increases over time in income and employment growth, and reductions in poverty rates in non‐metro counties. We find similar effects on metro county income and employment, but not on poverty dynamics.