Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

On the Number and Size of Cities

Contents:

Author Info

  • Tabuchi, Takatoshi
  • Thisse, Jacques-François
  • Zeng, Dao-Zhi

Abstract

We study the effects of a decrease in trade costs on the spatial distribution of industry in a multi-regional economy, when a rise in the regional population of workers generates higher urban costs. When the number of cities is unaffected by falling trade costs, small cities become smaller for large trade costs, medium-sized cities become smaller for medium values of trade costs, and large cities become smaller for small trade costs. Furthermore, when urban costs are ‘identical,’ we show that there exists a path of stable equilibria such that the industry, first, experiences progressive agglomeration into a decreasing number of cities and, then, dispersion into a growing number of cities. The second phase arises because of the increasing urban costs associated with the process of agglomeration.

Download Info

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
File URL: http://www.cepr.org/pubs/dps/DP3386.asp
Download Restriction: CEPR Discussion Papers are free to download for our researchers, subscribers and members. If you fall into one of these categories but have trouble downloading our papers, please contact us at subscribers@cepr.org

As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version under "Related research" (further below) or search for a different version of it.

Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers in its series CEPR Discussion Papers with number 3386.

as in new window
Length:
Date of creation: May 2002
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:3386

Contact details of provider:
Postal: Centre for Economic Policy Research, 77 Bastwick Street, London EC1V 3PZ
Phone: 44 - 20 - 7183 8801
Fax: 44 - 20 - 7183 8820

Order Information:
Email:

Related research

Keywords: agglomeration; city; multi-regional system; multiplicity of equilibria; transport costs; urban costs;

Find related papers by JEL classification:

This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

References

References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
as in new window
  1. Fujita, Masahisa & Krugman, Paul, 1995. "When is the economy monocentric?: von Thunen and Chamberlin unified," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 25(4), pages 505-528, August.
  2. Henderson, J V, 1974. "The Sizes and Types of Cities," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 64(4), pages 640-56, September.
  3. Keith Head & Thierry Mayer, 2000. "Non-Europe: The magnitude and causes of market fragmentation in the EU," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer, vol. 136(2), pages 284-314, June.
  4. Masahisa Fujita & Paul Krugman & Anthony J. Venables, 2001. "The Spatial Economy: Cities, Regions, and International Trade," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262561476.
  5. Krugman, Paul, 1991. "Increasing Returns and Economic Geography," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 99(3), pages 483-99, June.
  6. Fujita, Masahisa & Thisse, Jacques-Francois, 1996. "Economics of Agglomeration," Journal of the Japanese and International Economies, Elsevier, vol. 10(4), pages 339-378, December.
  7. Takatoshi Tabuchi & Dao-Zhi Zeng, 2000. "Stability of Spatial Equilibrium," CIRJE F-Series CIRJE-F-79, CIRJE, Faculty of Economics, University of Tokyo.
  8. McCallum, John, 1995. "National Borders Matter: Canada-U.S. Regional Trade Patterns," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(3), pages 615-23, June.
  9. OTTAVIANO, Gianmarco & THISSE, Jacques-François, 1999. "Agglomeration and trade revisited," CORE Discussion Papers 1999041, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
  10. Zeng, Dao-Zhi, 2002. "Equilibrium stability for a migration model," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 123-138, January.
  11. Ginsburgh, Victor & Papageorgiou, Yorgo & Thisse, Jacques-Francois, 1985. "On existence and stability of spatial equilibria and steady-states," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(2), pages 149-158, June.
  12. Tabuchi, Takatoshi & Thisse, Jacques-François, 2002. "Regional Specialization and Transport Costs," CEPR Discussion Papers 3542, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  13. Tabuchi, Takatoshi, 1998. "Urban Agglomeration and Dispersion: A Synthesis of Alonso and Krugman," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 44(3), pages 333-351, November.
  14. Krugman, Paul, 1993. "On the number and location of cities," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 37(2-3), pages 293-298, April.
  15. Fujita, Masahisa & Krugman, Paul & Mori, Tomoya, 1999. "On the evolution of hierarchical urban systems1," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 43(2), pages 209-251, February.
  16. T Tabuchi, 1986. "Existence and stability of city-size distribution in the gravity and logit models," Environment and Planning A, Pion Ltd, London, vol. 18(10), pages 1375-1389, October.
  17. Victor Ginsburgh & Yorgo Papageorgiou & Jacques-François Thisse, 1985. "On the existence and stability of spatial equilibria and steady states," ULB Institutional Repository 2013/1753, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

Citations

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

Cited by:
  1. Kristian Behrens & Frédéric Robert-Nicoud, 2009. "Survival of the Fittest in Cities: Agglomeration, Polarization, and Income Inequality," Cahiers de recherche 0919, CIRPEE.
  2. Kristian Behrens & Frédéric Robert-Nicoud, 2008. "Survival of the Fittest in Cities: Agglomeration, Selection and Polarisation," SERC Discussion Papers 0012, Spatial Economics Research Centre, LSE.
  3. Akamatsu, Takashi & Takayama, Yuki, 2009. "A Simplified Approach to Analyzing Multi-regional Core-Periphery Models," MPRA Paper 21739, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 29 Oct 2009.
  4. Pierre Picard & Takatoshi Tabuchi, 2010. "Self-organized agglomerations and transport costs," Economic Theory, Springer, vol. 42(3), pages 565-589, March.
  5. P M Picard & T Tabuchi, 2003. "Natural Agglomeration," The School of Economics Discussion Paper Series 0329, Economics, The University of Manchester.
  6. Takanori Ago & Ikumo Isono & Takatoshi Tabuchi, 2003. "Locational Disadvantage and Losses from Trade: Three Regions in Economic Geography," CIRJE F-Series CIRJE-F-224, CIRJE, Faculty of Economics, University of Tokyo.
  7. Fujita, Masahisa & Mori, Tomoya, 2005. "Frontiers of the New Economic Geography," IDE Discussion Papers 27, Institute of Developing Economies, Japan External Trade Organization(JETRO).
  8. Akamatsu, Takashi & Takayama, Yuki & Ikeda, Kiyohiro, 2009. "Spatial Discounting, Fourier, and Racetrack Economy: A Recipe for the Analysis of Spatial Agglomeration Models," MPRA Paper 21738, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 25 Dec 2009.
  9. Jens Südekum, 2009. "Regional costs-of-living with congestion and amenity differences: an economic geography perspective," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer, vol. 43(1), pages 49-69, March.
  10. Massimo Del Gatto, 2004. "Agglomeration, Integration, and Territorial Authority Scale in a System of Trading Cities. Centralisation versus Devolution," Working Papers 2004.93, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.

Lists

This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

Statistics

Access and download statistics

Corrections

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:3386

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: ().

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 references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link 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 profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

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