IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ucn/wpaper/202420.html

Driving over the hill: Car intensity during structural transformation

Author

Listed:
  • Ciara?n Mac Domhnaill

Abstract

This paper examines the number of licensed private cars in the economy per unit of GDP, or car intensity, as an intrinsic component of car use that may be underlying the observed peak car phenomenon. Using data on 88 countries from 1950 to 2010, I demonstrate that car intensity evolves in a hump-shaped pattern during economic development. I develop a general equilibrium model to argue that structural transformation can generate this trend. My calibrated model can account for just under a quarter of observed variation in car intensity among 54 countries in 2010. Counterfactual exercises show that the peak level of intensity is lower for economies that develop later.

Suggested Citation

  • Ciara?n Mac Domhnaill, 2024. "Driving over the hill: Car intensity during structural transformation," Working Papers 202420, School of Economics, University College Dublin.
    • Handle: RePEc:ucn:wpaper:202420
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10197/27935
    File Function: First version, 2024
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • O41 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - One, Two, and Multisector Growth Models
    • N10 - Economic History - - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; Fluctuations - - - General, International, or Comparative
    • O18 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Urban, Rural, Regional, and Transportation Analysis; Housing; Infrastructure
    • R10 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:ucn:wpaper:202420. 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.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using 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: UCD School of Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/educdie.html .

    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.