IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v11y2019i14p3770-d247049.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Agglomeration Economies in Small Cities and Business: The Impact of the Great Recession in Aragón (Spain)

Author

Listed:
  • Rafael González-Val

    (Departmento de Análisis Económico, Universidad de Zaragoza Facultad de Economía y Empresa (Campus Paraíso). c/ Gran Vía 2, 50005 Zaragoza, Spain
    Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB), Facultat d’Economia i Empresa, Universitat de Barcelona, c/ John M. Keynes, 1-11, 08034 Barcelona, Spain)

  • Miriam Marcén

    (Departmento de Análisis Económico, Universidad de Zaragoza Facultad de Economía y Empresa (Campus Paraíso). c/ Gran Vía 2, 50005 Zaragoza, Spain)

Abstract

In this paper, we analyze the effects of productive specialization and productive diversity on employment growth at the local level during the Great Recession in Aragon, a NUTS II region in Spain. This region is characterized by (i) a high population density in the capital city (around half of the total population), giving rise to a very uneven population distribution and therefore a lot of small cities and municipalities, and (ii) a large proportion of small businesses (95% of the firms in this region have fewer than ten employees). We use annual data from 2000 to 2015 and panel data models, and grouped local business activities into three main categories: industry, construction and services. Our results show that, during this period, local specialization in any of these activities hurt local employment growth, whereas diversity had a non-significant effect on employment growth. Only in the case of services did we obtain a positive effect of diversity on local employment growth, which was restricted to the most populated cities (i.e., cities with more than 3000 inhabitants). Therefore, only diversity in services activities located in large cities contributed to employment growth during the Great Recession.

Suggested Citation

  • Rafael González-Val & Miriam Marcén, 2019. "Agglomeration Economies in Small Cities and Business: The Impact of the Great Recession in Aragón (Spain)," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(14), pages 1-17, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:11:y:2019:i:14:p:3770-:d:247049
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/14/3770/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/14/3770/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. James J. Heckman, 1976. "The Common Structure of Statistical Models of Truncation, Sample Selection and Limited Dependent Variables and a Simple Estimator for Such Models," NBER Chapters, in: Annals of Economic and Social Measurement, Volume 5, number 4, pages 475-492, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Combes, Pierre-Philippe & Gobillon, Laurent, 2015. "The Empirics of Agglomeration Economies," 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 247-348, Elsevier.
    3. Mark D. Partridge & Dan S. Rickman & Kamar Ali & M. Rose Olfert, 2008. "Lost in space: population growth in the American hinterlands and small cities," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 8(6), pages 727-757, November.
    4. Glaeser, Edward L & Hedi D. Kallal & Jose A. Scheinkman & Andrei Shleifer, 1992. "Growth in Cities," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 100(6), pages 1126-1152, December.
      • Edward L. Glaeser & Hedi D. Kallal & Jose A. Scheinkman & Andrei Shleifer, 1991. "Growth in Cities," NBER Working Papers 3787, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
      • Glaeser, Edward Ludwig & Kallal, Hedi D. & Scheinkman, Jose A. & Shleifer, Andrei, 1992. "Growth in Cities," Scholarly Articles 3451309, Harvard University Department of Economics.
    5. Semykina, Anastasia & Wooldridge, Jeffrey M., 2010. "Estimating panel data models in the presence of endogeneity and selection," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 157(2), pages 375-380, August.
    6. Duranton, Gilles & Puga, Diego, 2004. "Micro-foundations of urban agglomeration economies," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, in: J. V. Henderson & J. F. Thisse (ed.), Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 48, pages 2063-2117, Elsevier.
    7. Francesca Mameli & Alessandra Faggian & Philip McCann, 2008. "Employment Growth in Italian Local Labour Systems: Issues of Model Specification and Sectoral Aggregation," Spatial Economic Analysis, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 3(3), pages 343-360.
    8. Donald Houston & Darja Reuschke, 2017. "City economies and microbusiness growth," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 54(14), pages 3199-3217, November.
    9. Heather M. Stephens & Mark D. Partridge, 2011. "Do Entrepreneurs Enhance Economic Growth in Lagging Regions?," Growth and Change, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 42(4), pages 431-465, December.
    10. Heckman, James, 2013. "Sample selection bias as a specification error," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 31(3), pages 129-137.
    11. Henderson, Vernon & Kuncoro, Ari & Turner, Matt, 1995. "Industrial Development in Cities," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 103(5), pages 1067-1090, October.
    12. Stephan J. Goetz & Anil Rupasingha, 2014. "The Determinants of Self-Employment Growth," Economic Development Quarterly, , vol. 28(1), pages 42-60, February.
    13. Gilles Duranton & J. V. Henderson & William C. Strange (ed.), 2015. "Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 5, number 5.
    14. Elisabet Viladecans-Marsal, 2004. "Agglomeration economies and industrial location: city-level evidence," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 4(5), pages 565-582, November.
    15. Jason Henderson & Stephan Weiler, 2010. "Entrepreneurs and Job Growth: Probing the Boundaries of Time and Space," Economic Development Quarterly, , vol. 24(1), pages 23-32, February.
    16. Melo, Patricia C. & Graham, Daniel J. & Noland, Robert B., 2009. "A meta-analysis of estimates of urban agglomeration economies," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(3), pages 332-342, May.
    17. Heather M. Stephens & Mark D. Partridge & Alessandra Faggian, 2013. "Innovation, Entrepreneurship And Economic Growth In Lagging Regions," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 53(5), pages 778-812, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Combes, Pierre-Philippe & Gobillon, Laurent, 2015. "The Empirics of Agglomeration Economies," 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 247-348, Elsevier.
    2. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/1kv8mtgl748r0ahh12air9erdc is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Roberto Basile & Cristiana Donati & Rosanna Pittiglio & Maria Savarese, 2015. "Dinamiche dell?occupazione e struttura produttiva locale in Italia," SCIENZE REGIONALI, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2015(2), pages 33-68.
    4. Roberto BASILE & Cristiana DONATI & Rosanna PITTIGLIO, 2013. "Industry Structure And Employment Growth: Evidence From Semiparametric Geoadditive Models," Region et Developpement, Region et Developpement, LEAD, Universite du Sud - Toulon Var, vol. 38, pages 121-160.
    5. Andrew Perumal, 2017. "42 Years of Urban Growth and Industry Composition," Atlantic Economic Journal, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 45(2), pages 133-147, June.
    6. Beltrán Tapia, Francisco J. & Díez-Minguela, Alfonso & Martinez-Galarraga, Julio, 2018. "Tracing the Evolution of Agglomeration Economies: Spain, 1860–1991," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 78(1), pages 81-117, March.
    7. Ehrl, Philipp & Monteiro Monasterio, Leonardo, 2016. "Historical trades, skills and agglomeration economies," MPRA Paper 69829, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Loredana Fattorini & Mahdi Ghodsi & Armando Rungi, 2020. "Cohesion Policy Meets Heterogeneous Firms," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 58(4), pages 803-817, July.
    9. Coll Martínez, Eva, 2017. "Creativity and the City: Testing the Attenuation of Agglomeration Economies fo r the Creative Industries in Barcelona," Working Papers 2072/292435, Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Department of Economics.
    10. Carlos Carreira & Luís Lopes, 2016. "Collecting new pieces to the regional knowledge spillovers puzzle: high-tech versus low-tech industries," GEMF Working Papers 2016-06, GEMF, Faculty of Economics, University of Coimbra.
    11. Albouy, David & Behrens, Kristian & Robert-Nicoud, Frédéric & Seegert, Nathan, 2019. "The optimal distribution of population across cities," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 102-113.
    12. Roberto Ganau & Andrés Rodríguez-Pose, 2022. "Does urban concentration matter for changes in country economic performance?," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 59(6), pages 1275-1299, May.
    13. Dauth, Wolfgang, 2010. "The mysteries of the trade: employment effects of urban interindustry spillovers," IAB-Discussion Paper 201015, Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany].
    14. Rafael González-Val, 2015. "Cross-sectional growth in US cities from 1990 to 2000," Journal of Geographical Systems, Springer, vol. 17(1), pages 83-106, January.
    15. Peters, Jan Cornelius, 2016. "Quantifying the effect of labor market size on learning externalities," Economics Working Papers 2016-11, Christian-Albrechts-University of Kiel, Department of Economics.
    16. Hanlon, W. Walker & Miscio, Antonio, 2017. "Agglomeration: A long-run panel data approach," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 99(C), pages 1-14.
    17. Grace Carolina Guevara-Rosero & Stéphane Riou & Corinne Autant-Bernard, 2019. "Agglomeration externalities in Ecuador: do urbanization and tertiarization matter?," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 53(5), pages 706-719, May.
    18. Raspe, Otto & van Oort, Frank, 2008. "Firm Growth and Localized Knowledge Externalities," Journal of Regional Analysis and Policy, Mid-Continent Regional Science Association, vol. 38(2), pages 1-17.
    19. Stefan P. T. Groot & Henri L. F. Groot, 2020. "Estimating the Skill Bias in Agglomeration Externalities and Social Returns to Education: Evidence from Dutch Matched Worker-Firm Micro-Data," De Economist, Springer, vol. 168(1), pages 53-78, March.
    20. Beaudry, Catherine & Schiffauerova, Andrea, 2009. "Who's right, Marshall or Jacobs? The localization versus urbanization debate," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(2), pages 318-337, March.
    21. Koster, Hans R.A. & Ozgen, Ceren, 2021. "Cities and tasks," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(C).

    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:gam:jsusta:v:11:y:2019:i:14:p:3770-:d:247049. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    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.