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The Costs of Agglomeration: Land Prices in French Cities

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Listed:
  • Combes, Pierre-Philippe

    (GATE, University of Lyon)

  • Duranton, Gilles

    (University of Pennsylvania)

  • Gobillon, Laurent

    (Paris School of Economics)

Abstract

We develop a new methodology to estimate the elasticity of urban costs with respect to city population using French land price data. Our preferred estimate, which handles a number of estimation concerns, stands at 0.041. Our approach also yields a number of intermediate outputs of independent interest such as a distance gradient for land prices and the elasticity of unit land prices with respect to city population. For the latter, our preferred estimate is 0.72.

Suggested Citation

  • Combes, Pierre-Philippe & Duranton, Gilles & Gobillon, Laurent, 2012. "The Costs of Agglomeration: Land Prices in French Cities," IZA Discussion Papers 7027, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
  • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp7027
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    urban costs; land prices; land use; agglomeration;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • R14 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Land Use Patterns
    • R21 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Household Analysis - - - Housing Demand
    • R31 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Real Estate Markets, Spatial Production Analysis, and Firm Location - - - Housing Supply and Markets

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