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Commuting, Labor, and Housing Market Effects of Mass Transportation: Welfare and Identification

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  • Christopher Severen

    (Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia)

Abstract

I study Los Angeles Metro Rail's effects using panel data on bilateral commuting flows, a quantitative spatial model, and historically motivated quasi-experimental research designs. The model separates transit's commuting effects from local productivity or amenity effects, and spatial shift-share instruments identify inelastic labor and housing supply. Metro Rail connections increase commuting by 16% but do not have large effects on local productivity or amenities. Metro Rail generates $94 million in annual benefits by 2000 or 12–25% of annualized costs. Accounting for reduced congestion and slow transit adoption adds, at most, another $200 million in annual benefits.

Suggested Citation

  • Christopher Severen, 2023. "Commuting, Labor, and Housing Market Effects of Mass Transportation: Welfare and Identification," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 105(5), pages 1073-1091, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:tpr:restat:v:105:y:2023:i:5:p:1073-1091
    DOI: 10.1162/rest_a_01100
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    Cited by:

    1. Redding, Stephen & Nakajima, Kentaro & Miyauchi, Yuhei, 2021. "Consumption access and agglomeration: evidence from smartphone data," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 114353, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    2. Tobias Pfutze & Carlos Rodríguez-Castelán & Daniel Valderrama, 2023. "Urban transport infrastructure and household welfare: evidence from Colombia," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 65(3), pages 1409-1432, September.
    3. Tyndall, Justin, 2021. "The local labour market effects of light rail transit," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 124(C).
    4. Nathaniel Baum-Snow & Daniel Hartley & Kwan Ok Lee, 2019. "The Long-Run Effects of Neighborhood Change on Incumbent Families," Working Paper Series WP-2019-2, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
    5. Jonathan I. Dingel & Felix Tintelnot, 2020. "Spatial Economics for Granular Settings," NBER Working Papers 27287, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Sitian Liu & Yichen Su, 2020. "The Geography of Jobs and the Gender Wage Gap," Working Papers 2028, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
    7. Du, Rui & Zheng, Siqi, 2020. "Agglomeration, housing affordability, and new firm formation: The role of subway network," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(C).
    8. Rhiannon Jerch & Panle Jia Barwick & Shanjun Li & Jing Wu, 2020. "Road Rationing Policies and Housing Markets," DETU Working Papers 2004, Department of Economics, Temple University.
    9. Christensen, Peter & Osman, Adam, 2021. "The Demand for Mobility: Evidence from an Experiment with Uber Riders," IZA Discussion Papers 14179, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    10. Priest, Lachlan, 2021. "Transport Access and the Labour Market in the United States," Warwick-Monash Economics Student Papers 17, Warwick Monash Economics Student Papers.
    11. Basso, Leonardo J. & Navarro, Matias & Silva, Hugo E., 2021. "Public transport and urban structure," Economics of Transportation, Elsevier, vol. 28(C).
    12. Gupta, Arpit & Van Nieuwerburgh, Stijn & Kontokosta, Constantine, 2022. "Take the Q train: Value capture of public infrastructure projects," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 129(C).
    13. Gabriel E. Kreindler & Yuhei Miyauchi, 2019. "Measuring Commuting and Economic Activity inside Cities with Cell Phone Records," Boston University - Department of Economics - Working Papers Series WP2020-006, Boston University - Department of Economics, revised Apr 2020.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • J61 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Geographic Labor Mobility; Immigrant Workers
    • L91 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Transportation and Utilities - - - Transportation: General
    • R13 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - General Equilibrium and Welfare Economic Analysis of Regional Economies
    • R40 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Transportation Economics - - - General

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