To Migrate or to Commute?

In this paper, we investigate the agglomeration patterns in a New Economic Geography model when commuting is allowed. The introduction of both commuting and housing costs leads to a disentangling of the agglomeration of firms and people. Commuting al- lows workers to continue living in agglomerations and enjoying the benefits of a larger product variety, despite high housing costs, since they may choose to commute to another place where they receive higher wages, which in turn enables them to cover high housing costs at their place of living. This observation is especially true for skilled workers, who generally are more mobile than unskilled workers.New Economic Geography, Commuting, Mobility of workers, Commuting costs, Housing costs

Taxation, infrastructure, and endogenous trade costs in New Economic Geography

This paper presents a New Economic Geography model with distortionary taxation and endogenized trade costs. Tax revenues finance a public good, infrastructure. We show that the introduction of costly public investment in infrastructure increases agglomerative tendencies. With respect to the regions' sizes, in the periphery, the price-index for manufacturing goods decreases, whereas for the core, the price-index is rather high since the distortionary effect of taxes dominates. 'Free riding' - or, in terms of regional policy, externally funded infrastructure investment - is beneficial for the periphery, which can devote all its tax revenue to local demand support, generating a positive home market effect and driving the catch-up process.New Economic Geography; Taxation; Endogenous Trade Costs; Infrastructure; Regional Policy

No Taxation without Infrastructure

This paper presents a New Economic Geography model with distortionary taxation and endogenized transport costs. Tax revenues finance a public good, infrastructure. We show that the introduction of costly public investment in infrastructure leads to more pronounced agglomeration patterns. With respect to the regions sizes, in the periphery, the price-index for manufacturing goods decreases, whereas for the core, the price-index is rather high since the distortionary effect of taxes dominates. Free riding is beneficial for the periphery, which can devote all its tax revenue to local demand support, generating a positive home market effect and driving the catch-up process.New Economic Geography, Taxation, Endogenous Transport Costs, Infrastructure

The Long-term Consequences of Migration – Subjective Well-being and Cognitive Abilities of Older Migrants in Europe

Migration and population ageing belong to the central challenges for the current and future Europe. Since 1985, the number of inhabitants in European countries who were born outside their country of residence has more than doubled. Besides, already by 2020, a quarter of Europeans will be over 60 years old. Both developments will have substantial impacts on numerous aspects of the European society. Using data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE), this volume investigates one of the intersections between migration and ageing by putting the focus on persons aged 50+ who migrated at some point in their life and now grow old abroad. Until now, little is known about the long-term consequences of migration. In the three studies of his thesis, Stefan Gruber investigates in how far migrants are affected by having migrated with regard to two different outcomes: subjective well-being and cognitive functioning

To Migrate or to Commute?

In this paper, we investigate the agglomeration patterns in a New Economic Geography model when commuting is allowed. The introduction of both commuting and housing costs leads to a disentangling of the agglomeration of firms and people. Commuting allows workers to continue living in agglomerations and enjoying the benefits of a larger product variety, despite high housing costs, since they may choose to commute to another place where they receive higher wages, which in turn enables them to cover high housing costs at their place of living. This observation is especially true for skilled workers, who generally are more mobile than unskilled workers

Knowledge-Capital Meets New Economic Geography

We incorporate the now standard knowledge-capital model of multinational firms in a new economic geography setting. The theoretical predictions of our model suggest that unskilled labor mobility leads to less concentration of production than skilled labor mobility does. This is in line with empirical evidence that agglomeration of production among European nations is less pronounced than among US regions. Our model shows that the different patterns in labor mobility can explain actual differences in the spreading of industries. According to our welfare analysis, trade liberalization is likely Pareto-improving for a larger (smaller) country with mobile unskilled (skilled) labor. In the supplement, we investigate the sensitivity of our results in several respects. In the first section, we provide the figures of real factor rewards for the trade liberalization scenarios discussed in and underlying Figures 7 and 8 of the paper. Second, in Figures 3(n) - 5(v) (6(n) - 6b(v)) we infer the existence, or non-existence, of each firm type separately in the τ - λ L-space (τ - λ S-space) for country i firms and all four scenarios of firm regimes. Third, we illustrate how changes in the parameters μ, ρ and σ affect the outcome. Finally, we analyze how the asymmetric endowment with the immobile factor influences the core-periphery patterns.knowledge-capital model, new economic geography, unskilled labor mobility, skilled labor mobility

Taxation, Infrastructure, and Endogenous Trade Costs in New Economic Geography

This paper presents a New Economic Geography model with distortionary taxation and endogenized trade costs. Tax revenues finance a public good, infrastructure. We show that the introduction of costly public investment in infrastructure increases agglomerative tendencies. With respect to the regions' sizes, in the periphery, the price-index for manufacturing goods decreases, whereas for the core, the price-index is rather high since the distortionary effect of taxes dominates. 'Free riding' ¡ or, in terms of regional policy, externally funded infrastructure investment; is beneficial for the periphery, which can devote all its tax revenue to local demand support, generating a positive home market effect and driving the catch-up process

Inequality in health care utilization in Germany? Theoretical and empirical evidence for specialist consultation

Aim: In view of increasing concern about a two-class system in the German health care sector, this study investigates the relevance of health insurance schemes and other socioeconomic characteristics to the level of specialist health care provision. Subjects and Methods: Referring to Ronald M. Andersen’s model of health care utilization and more content-based approaches, we implement a negative binomial hurdle regression to estimate the number of specialist visits within the last 12 months. Our data source is the German sample of the first wave of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) in 2004. Results: The results show that men’s number of specialist visits is markedly sensitive to predisposing and enabling factors, whereas women’s health care utilization depends less on such socioeconomic characteristics. With reference to previous findings concerning general practitioner consultation, the assumption of a bipolar health care system providing general practitioner care primarily to the statutory insured and specialist care to the privately insured is supported empirically as to men. Education, which is considered to be highly correlated with health lifestyles, has a positive effect on medical health care. Every additional year of education increases by about 10% the probability of men seeking specialist consultation. Furthermore, the results indicate an unfavorable situation for the self-employed concerning health care because of their specific employment situation and health insurance coverage. Discussion: The research results suggest the existence of relevant differences in the amount of specialist consultation according to health insurance and other socioeconomic features. Further research could concentrate on the question of whether these inequalities in utilization levels indicate overprovision or underprovision of ambulant health care. Moreover, we recommend longitudinal research that is particularly suited to detangle age and cohort effects