We develop a two-region population growth model of economic geography and show that a process of urbanization has a substantial impact on the evolution of manufacturing real wages. Whereas real wages decline as the population increases when the spatial structure of the economy is fixed, they actually rise in the long-run when factors are mobile. Agglomeration may hence be seen as a rational response to declining real wages and provides a new explanation of why manufacturing real wages did not decline prior to the Industrial Revolution in England, despite a historically unprecedented population growth.
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Paper provided by Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE) in its series CORE Discussion Papers with number
2004025.
Find related papers by JEL classification: N13 - Economic History - - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Growth and Fluctuations - - - Europe: Pre-1913 N33 - Economic History - - Labor and Consumers, Demography, Education, Income, and Wealth - - - Europe: Pre-1913 R11 - Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Analysis of Growth, Development, and Changes R12 - Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Size and Spatial Distributions of Regional Economic Activity; Interregional Trade (economic geography)
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Baldwin, Richard E. & Martin, Philippe, 2004.
"Agglomeration and regional growth,"
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 60, pages 2671-2711
Elsevier.
[Downloadable!] (restricted)
Other versions:
Martin, Philippe & Ottaviano, Gianmarco I P, 2001.
"Growth and Agglomeration,"
International Economic Review,
Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 42(4), pages 947-68, November.
Other versions:
Gianmarco Ottaviano & Takatoshi Tabuchi & Jacques-FranÁois Thisse, 2002.
"Agglomeration and Trade Revisited,"
International Economic Review,
Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 43(2), pages 409-436, May.
[Downloadable!] (restricted)
Other versions:
OTTAVIANO, Gianmarco & TABUCHI, Takatoshi & THISSE, Jacques-Franois, 1999.
"Agglomeration and trade revisited,"
CORE Discussion Papers
1999041, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
[Downloadable!]
Gianmarco Ottaviano & Takatoshi Tabuchi & Jacques-Francois Tissse, 1999.
"Agglomeration and Trade Revisited,"
CIRJE F-Series
CIRJE-F-65, CIRJE, Faculty of Economics, University of Tokyo.
[Downloadable!]