IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/jregsc/v41y2001i3p507-520.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Land Markets in the Harris‐Todaro Model: A New Factor Equilibrating Rural‐Urban Migration

Author

Listed:
  • Jan K. Brueckner
  • Hyun‐A Kim

Abstract

Recent research in the Harris‐Todaro (HT) tradition has added an important new element to the model by incorporating an urban land market. Brueckner and Zenou (1999) (hereafter BZ) argue that a model where migration equalizes expected wages between city and countryside may overlook another important force that equilibrates the process of rural‐urban migration. This force is the migration‐induced rise in the urban cost of living, which occurs principally through escalation of urban land rents as the city population expands. Land‐rent escalation, which tends to limit rural‐urban migration, provides an important additional force that may help determine city sizes in developing countries. The present paper provides a simpler alternative to BZ's analysis by assuming that urban residents smooth their income as they cycle between formal and informal employment. This allows migration decisions to be based on the expected wage, as in the usual HT framework, in a model that includes a land market. The analysis shows that this modified framework generates results slightly different from those of BZ.

Suggested Citation

  • Jan K. Brueckner & Hyun‐A Kim, 2001. "Land Markets in the Harris‐Todaro Model: A New Factor Equilibrating Rural‐Urban Migration," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(3), pages 507-520, August.
  • Handle: RePEc:bla:jregsc:v:41:y:2001:i:3:p:507-520
    DOI: 10.1111/0022-4146.00228
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/0022-4146.00228
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/0022-4146.00228?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Yves Zenou, 2011. "Rural–Urban Migration And Unemployment: Theory And Policy Implications," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 51(1), pages 65-82, February.
    2. Roberto A. De Santis, 2003. "The Impact of a Customs Union with the European Union on Internal Migration in Turkey," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 43(2), pages 349-372, May.
    3. Daisuke Matsuzaki & Yoshiyasu Ono, 2021. "Regional subsidies and interregional labor movement," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 66(3), pages 557-577, June.
    4. Maureen Kilkenny, 2010. "Urban/Regional Economics And Rural Development," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(1), pages 449-470, February.
    5. Héctor M. Posada & Ana I. Moreno-Monroy, 2017. "Informality, city structure and rural–urban migration in Latin America," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 59(2), pages 345-369, September.
    6. Lee, Chul-In, 2008. "Migration and the wage and unemployment gaps between urban and non-urban sectors: A dynamic general equilibrium reinterpretation of the Harris-Todaro equilibrium," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(6), pages 1416-1434, December.
    7. João Ricardo Faria & Franklin G. Mixon, 2022. "Labor Markets and Sustainability: Short-Run Dynamics and Long-Run Equilibrium," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(7), pages 1-10, April.
    8. Pekkala, Sari, 2003. "What Draws People to Urban Growth Centers: Jobs vs. Pay?," Discussion Papers 310, VATT Institute for Economic Research.
    9. Busso, Matias & Chauvin, Juan Pablo & Herrera L., Nicolás, 2021. "Rural-urban migration at high urbanization levels," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    10. Marco Baudino, 2021. "Rural-to-urban migration in developing economies: characterizing the role of the rural labor supply in the process of urban agglomeration and city growth," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 66(3), pages 533-556, June.
    11. Brueckner, Jan K. & Lall, Somik V., 2015. "Cities in Developing Countries," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, in: Gilles Duranton & J. V. Henderson & William C. Strange (ed.), Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 0, pages 1399-1455, Elsevier.
    12. Hazans, Mihails, 2003. "Commuting in the Baltic States: Patterns, determinants and gains," ZEI Working Papers B 02-2003, University of Bonn, ZEI - Center for European Integration Studies.
    13. Zenou, Yves, 2005. "The Todaro Paradox Revisited," IZA Discussion Papers 1861, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    14. Zenou, Yves, 2008. "Job search and mobility in developing countries. Theory and policy implications," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(2), pages 336-355, June.
    15. Garriga, Carlos & Hedlund, Aaron & Tang, Yang & Wang, Ping, 2021. "Rural-urban migration and house prices in China," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(C).
    16. Tian Tian & Meizhu Hao & Zhanlu Zhang & Duan Ran, 2024. "Urbanization in Dynamics: The Influence of Land Quota Trading on Land and Population Urbanization," Land, MDPI, vol. 13(2), pages 1-20, January.
    17. Chul‐In Lee, 2010. "Can Search‐Matching Models Explain Migration And Wage And Unemployment Gaps In Developing Economies? A Calibration Approach," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(2), pages 635-654, May.
    18. Masaharu Nagashima, 2018. "A condition for the reduction of urban unemployment in the Harris–Todaro model," Asia-Pacific Journal of Regional Science, Springer, vol. 2(1), pages 243-255, April.
    19. Pi Jiancai & Yin Jun, 2016. "Privatization, Unemployment, and Welfare in the Harris-Todaro Model with a Mixed Duopoly," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 16(4), pages 1-12, October.
    20. Hazans, Mihails, 2002. "Social returns to commuting in the Baltic states," ERSA conference papers ersa02p232, European Regional Science Association.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:jregsc:v:41:y:2001:i:3:p:507-520. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0022-4146 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.