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Abstract:
A monopolistically competitive manufacturing sector produces goods used for final consumption and as intermediates. Intermediate usage creates cost and demand linkages between firms and a tendency for manufacturing agglomeration. How does globalization affect the location of manufacturing and gains from trade? At high transport costs all countries have some manufacturing, but when transport costs fall below a critical value a core-periphery pattern spontaneously forms, and nations that find themselves in the periphery suffer a decline in real income. At still lower transport costs there is convergence of real incomes, in which peripheral nations gain and core nations may lose.

Abstract:
Multinationals have become increasingly important to the world economy. Overseas production by U.S. affiliates is three times U.S. exports, for example. Who is investing where, for sales where?

Much foreign direct investment is between high-income countries, but investment in some developing and transition regions, while still modest, grew rapidly in the 1990s.

Adjusting for market size, much investment stays close to home; adjusting for distance, much heads toward the countries with the biggest markets. Foreign direct investment is more geographically concentrated than either exports or production. Thus U.S. affiliate production in Europe is 7 times U.S. exports to Europe; that ratio drops to 4 for all industrial countries and to 1.6 for developing countries.

Multinational activity in high-income countries is overwhelmingly horizontal, involving production for sale to the host country market. In developing countries, a greater proportion of multinational activity is vertical, involving manufacturing at intermediate stages of production. Thus only 4 percent of U.S. affiliate production in the European Union is sold back to the United States, whereas for developing countries the figure is 18 percent, rising to 40 percent for Mexico. Similarly, less than 10 percent of Japan's affiliate production in the EU is sold back to Japan, compared with more than 20 percent in developing countries. In models of horizontal activity, the decision to go multinational is a tradeoff between the additional fixed costs involved in setting up a new plant and the savings in variable costs (transport costs and tariffs) on exports. In models of vertical activity, direct investment is motivated by differences in factor costs. Tariffs and transport costs both encourage vertical multinational activity (by magnifying differences in factor prices) and discourage it (by making trade between headquarters and an affiliate more expensive).

The major outward investors carry out much horizontal investment in large markets. For U.S. investors, this means Europe, especially the United Kingdom; for Japan and Europe, it means the United States. Most EU investments, however, stay within the EU.

The major outward investors carry out much of their vertical investment closer to home: the United States, in Mexico; the EU, in Central and Eastern Europe; Japan, in Asia.

This paper - a product of Trade, Development Research Group - is part of a larger effort in the group to study the location of economic activity. Anthony J. Venables may be contacted at a.j.venables@lse.ac.uk.

Abstract:
The median landlocked country has only 30 percent of the trade volume of the median coastal economy. Halving transport costs increases that trade volume by a factor of five. Improving the standard of infrastructure from that of the bottom quarter of countries to that of the median country increases trade by 50 percent. Improving infrastructure in Sub-Saharan Africa is especially important for increasing African trade.

Limao and Venables use three different data sets to investigate how transport depends on geography and infrastructure. Landlocked countries have high transport costs, which can be substantially reduced by improving the quality of their infrastructure and that of transit countries.

Analysis of bilateral trade data confirms the importance of infrastructure. Limão and Venables estimate the elasticity of trade flows with regard to transport costs to be high, at about -2.5. This means that:
· The median landlocked country has only 30 percent of the trade volume of the median coastal economy.
· Halving transport costs increases the volume of trade by a factor of five.
· Improving infrastructure from the 75th to the 50th percentile increases trade by 50 percent.

Using their results and a basic gravity model to study Sub-Saharan African trade, both internally and with the rest of the world, Limao and Venables find that infrastructure problems largely explain the relatively low levels of African trade.

This paper - a product of Trade, Development Research Group - is part of a larger effort in the group to investigate the effects of geography on economic performance. The authors may be contacted at ngl4@columbia.edu or avenables@worldbank.org.

Abstract:
What drives growth at the microeconomic level? Burgess and Venables divide the factors that determine a location's growth performance into two groups, 1st advantage and 2nd advantage. The term 1st advantage refers to the conditions that provide the environment in which new activities can be profitably developed, including most of the factors on which traditional theory has focused, such as access to inputs (labor and capital), access to markets, provision of basic infrastructure, and the institutional environment. The term 2nd advantage refers to factors that increase returns to scale and can lead to cumulative causation processes. They may be acquired by learning, through technological spillovers, or by the development of thick markets of suppliers and local skills.

The authors' analysis suggests that empirical investigation of the drivers of growth must shift down to a more microeconomic level. Such an analysis has become more feasible as data at the subnational level have become more available. By viewing recent empirical evidence on drivers of growth through their analytical framework, the authors are able to begin to sketch out a microeconomic agenda for growth. They emphasize that it is the manner in which 1st and 2nd advantages interact that shapes the pattern of development.

The authors then turn to the example of how policy has affected manufacturing growth performance in India. They analyze links between the direction of state-level labor regulation and growth in the organized manufacturing sector, how state-led expansion of bank branches into rural areas has affected unregistered or informal manufacturing, and how the pre-reform technological capability of industries affected their response to liberalization in 1991.

The analysis suggests that policy choices at the local level affect growth. Both theory and empirics need to downshift to the microeconomic level if we are to make advances in identifying specific means of encouraging innovation and growth.

This paper is a product of Partnerships, Capacity Building, Development Economics Senior Vice Presidency.

Growth, development, structural change, clustering

Abstract:
Developing countries may be better served by north-south than by south-south free trade agreements. Free trade agreements between low-income countries tend to lead to divergence in member country incomes, while agreements between high-income countries tend to lead to convergence.
Venables examines how benefits - and costs - of a free trade area are divided among member countries.

Outcomes depend on the member countries' comparative advantage, relative to one another and to the rest of the world.

Venables finds that free trade agreements between low-income countries tend to lead to divergence in member country incomes, while agreements between high-income countries tend to lead to convergence.

Changes induced by comparative advantage may be amplified by the effects of agglomeration.

The results suggest that developing countries may be better served by north-south than by south-south free trade agreements, because north-south agreements increase their prospects for convergence with high-income members of the free trade area.

In north-south free trade agreements, additional forces are likely to operate. The agreement may be used, for example, as a commitment mechanism to lock in economic reforms (as happened in Mexico with the North American Free Trade Agreement and in Eastern European countries with the European Union). A free trade agreement may also - through its effect on trade and through foreign direct investment - promote technology transfer to lower-income members.

This paper - a product of Trade, Development Research Group - is part of a larger effort in the group to study the effects of regional integration. The author may be contacted at avenables@worldbank.org.

Abstract:
This paper analyses a model of economic development in which international inequalities in the location of industry and income are supported by the agglomeration of industry in a subset of countries. Economic development may not be a gradual process of convergence by all countries, but instead involves countries moving sequentially from the group of poor countries to the group of rich countries. The role of trade policy in promoting industrialization is studied. While both import substitution and unilateral trade liberalization may be "successful" in attracting industry, they attract different sectors and welfare levels are higher under trade liberalization.

Abstract:
What effect does distance have on costs for economies at different locations? Exports and imports of final and intermediate goods bear transport costs that increase with distance. Production and trade depend on factor endowments and factor intensities as well as on distance and the transport intensities of different goods.

The combination of distance, poor infrastructure, and being landlocked by neighbors with poor infrastructure can make transport costs many times higher for some developing countries than for most others.

Drawing on two traditions of economic modeling - Heckscher-Ohlin trade theory and von Thunen's work on the isolated state - Venables and Limao analyze the trade and production patterns of countries located at varying distances from an economic center.

Predicting a country's production and trade pattern requires knowledge of the country's location, its factor endowment, and the factor intensities and transport intensities of goods.

Venables and Limao define transport intensity and show how location and transport intensity should be combined with factor abundance and factor intensity in determining trade flows. A theory based on only one set of those variables, such as factor abundance, will systematically make incorrect predictions.

They report that geography and endowments interact in such a way that the world divides up into economic zones with different trade patterns.

Countries close to the economic center may specialize in transport-intensive activities; countries further out become diversified, producing and sometimes trading more goods; countries still further out may become import-substituting (replacing some of their imports from the center with local production); in the extreme, regions become autarkic. More remote locations have lower real incomes.

Globalization changes the terms of trade, improving the welfare of regions further out from economic centers, though reducing the welfare of closer regions.

Where will a new activity, such as assembly of a new product, locate? Remote locations are disadvantaged if the product has high transport intensity (perhaps because of heavy requirements for intermediate inputs). But the costs of remoteness are already incorporated into the factor prices of those regions, which makes them more attractive. Which location is chosen depends, therefore, on how existing activities compare with the new activity in transport intensity and factor intensity.

This paper - a product of Trade, Development Research Group - is part of a larger effort in the group to study the location of economic activity. The authors may be contacted at avenables@worldbank.org or ngl4@columbia.edu

Abstract:
Classic trade questions are reconsidered by generalizing a factor-proportions model to multiple countries, multi-stage production, and country-specific trade costs. We derive patterns of production specialization and trade for a matrix of countries that differ in relative endowments (columns) and trade costs (rows). We demonstrate how the ability to fragment production and/or a proportional change in all countries' trade costs alters these patterns. Production specialization and the volume of trade are higher with fragmentation for most countries but interestingly, for a large block of countries, these variables fall following fragmentation. Countries with moderate trade costs engage in market-oriented assembly, while those with lower trade costs engage in export-platform production. These two cases correspond to the concepts of horizontal and vertical affiliate production in the literature on multinational enterprises. Increases in specialization and the volume of trade accelerate as trade costs go to zero with and without fragmentation.

Multi-country, factor-proportions, trade costs

Abstract:
Classic trade questions are reconsidered by generalizing a factor-proportions model to multiple countries, multi-stage production, and country-specific trade costs. We derive patterns of production specialization and trade for a matrix of countries that differ in relative endowments (columns) and trade costs (rows). We demonstrate how the ability to fragment production and/or a proportional change in all countries' trade costs alters these patterns. Production specialization and the volume of trade are higher with fragmentation for most countries but interestingly, for a large block of countries, these variables fall following fragmentation. Countries with moderate trade costs engage in market-oriented assembly, while those with lower trade costs engage in export-platform production. These two cases correspond to the concepts of horizontal and vertical affiliate production in the literature on multinational enterprises. Increases in specialization and the volume of trade accelerate as trade costs go to zero with and without fragmentation.

Multi-country, fragmentation, trade costs, multinationals

Abstract:
Classic trade questions are reconsidered by generalizing a factor-proportions model to multiple countries, multi-stage production, and country-specific trade costs. We derive patterns of production specialization and trade for a matrix of countries that differ in relative endowments (columns) and trade costs (rows). We demonstrate how the ability to fragment production and/or a proportional change in all countries' trade costs alters these patterns. Production specialization and the volume of trade are higher with fragmentation for most countries but interestingly, for a large block of countries, these variables fall following fragmentation. Countries with moderate trade costs engage in market-oriented assembly, while those with lower trade costs engage in export-platform production. These two cases correspond to the concepts of horizontal and vertical affiliate production in the literature on multinational enterprises. Increases in specialization and the volume of trade accelerate as trade costs go to zero with and without fragmentation.

Abstract:
A new approach to analyzing the role of trade in promoting industrial development.

How do different trading arrangements influence the industrialization process of developing countries? Can preferential trading arrangements (PTAs) be superior to multilateral liberalization, or at least an alternative when multilateral liberalization proceeds slowly? If so, what form should the PTAs take? Are developing countries better advised to seek PTAs with industrial countries or among themselves?
Traditional analysis of these issues has been based on the ideas of trade creation and trade diversion. The problem with this analysis is that it starts from assuming a pattern of comparative advantage. This stands in sharp contrast to the apparently changing comparative advantage of newly industrialized countries. The experience of these countries suggests the need for an analysis in which the pattern of comparative advantage is not set in stone but is potentially flexible, and in which less developed countries can develop and converge in both income and economic structure to industrial economies.

Puga and Venables outline an alternative approach for analyzing the role of trade in promoting industrial development. There are few fundamental differences between countries that generate immutable patterns of comparative advantage. Instead the pattern of trade and development in the world economy is determined mainly by history. Cumulative causation has created concentrations of industrial activity in particular locations (industrial countries) and left other areas more dependent on primary activities. Economic development can be thought of as the spread of these concentrations from country to country. Different trading arrangements may have a major impact on this development process. By changing the attractiveness of countries as a base for manufacturing production they can potentially trigger or postpone industrial development.
This approach explains why firms are reluctant to move to economies that have lower wages and labor costs, and shows how trade liberalization can change the incentives to become established in developing countries. It provides a mechanism through which import liberalization can have a powerful effect in promoting industrialization. And it suggests that import liberalization may create or amplify differences between liberalizing countries with the possible political tensions this may create. While these features are consistent with the world economy, they fall short of providing convincing empirical support for the approach.

Using the approach, the authors derive a number of conclusions about the effects of trade liberalization. First, that unilaterally liberalizing imports of manufactures can promote development of the local manufacturing industry. The mechanism is forward linkages from imported intermediates, but this may be interpreted as part of a wider package of linkages coming from these imports. Second, the gains from liberalization through PTA membership are likely to exceed those obtained from unilateral action. South-South PTAs will be sensitive to the market size of member states, and North-South PTAs seem to offer better prospects for participating Southern economies, if not for North and excluded countries. Third, the effects of particular schemes (such as the division of benefits between Southern economies) will depend on the characteristics of the countries and cross-country differences in these characteristics.

This paper - a product of the International Trade Division, International Economics Department - was prepared for the research project on regional integration.

Abstract:
This paper contributes to research endogenizing multinational firms in general-equilibrium trade models. We attempt to integrate separate contributions on horizontal multinationals which produce the same final product in multiple locations, with work on vertical multinationals, which geographically fragment production by stages. Previously derived results now emerge as special cases of a more general model. Vertical multinationals dominate when countries are very different in relative factor endowments. Horizontal multinationals dominate when the countries are similar in size and in relative endowments, and trade costs are moderate to high. In some cases, foreign investment or trade liberalization leads to a reversal in the direction of trade. Investment liberalization can also lead to an increase in the volume of trade and produces a strong tendency toward factor-price equalization. Thus direct investment can be a complement to trade in both a volume-of-trade sense and in a welfare sense.

Abstract:
This Paper argues that a geographical perspective is fundamental to understanding comparative economic development in the context of globalization. Central to this view is the role of agglomeration in productivity performance; size and location matter. The tools of the new economic geography are used to illuminate important episodes when the relative position of major economies radically changed: the rise of the United States at the beginning and of East Asia at the end of the 20th century. It is suggested that while lack of high quality institutions has been a major reason for falling behind geographic disadvantages also merit attention.

Globalization, economic geography, economic history

Abstract:
How does an FDI project affect local firms in the same industry? Competition in the" product and factor markets tends to reduce profits of local firms, but linkage effects to supplier" industries may reduce input costs and raise profits. This paper develops an analytical framework" to assess these effects. Circumstances in which FDI is complementary to local industry are" established, and it is shown how FDI may lead to the establishment of local industrial sectors. " These sectors may grow to the point where local production overtakes and forces out FDI plants. " Our results are consistent with the experience of a number of industrial sectors in the NICs."

Abstract:
In the United States, many industries have a Silicon Valley-type geographic localization. In Europe, these same industries often have four or more major centers of production. This difference is presumably the result of the formal and informal trade barriers that have divided the European market. With the growing integration of that market, however, there is the possibility that Europe will develop an American-style economic geography. This paper uses a theoretical model of industrial localization to demonstrate this possibility, and to show the possible transition costs associated with this shift.

Abstract:
This paper investigates the determinants of countries' export performance looking in particular at the role of international product market linkages. We begin with a novel decomposition of the growth in countries' exports into the contribution from increases in external demand and from improved internal supply-side conditions. Building on the results of this decomposition we move on to an econometric analysis of the determinants of export performance. Results include the finding that poor external geography, poor internal geography, and poor institutional quality contribute in approximately equal measure to explaining Sub-Saharan Africa's poor export performance.

Abstract:
This Paper investigates the determinants of countries' export performance looking in particular at the role of international product market linkages. We begin with a novel decomposition of the growth in countries' exports into the contribution from increases in external demand and from improved internal supply-side conditions. Building on the results of this decomposition, we move on to an econometric analysis of the determinants of export performance. Results include the finding that poor external geography, poor internal geography, and poor institutional quality contribute in approximately equal measure to explaining Sub-Saharan Africa's poor export performance.

Economic development, economic geography, international trade

Abstract:
A windfall of natural resource revenue (or foreign aid) faces government with choices of how to manage public debt, investment, and the distribution of funds for consumption, particularly if the windfall is both anticipated and temporary. We show that the permanent income hypothesis prescription of an ever-lasting increase in consumption financed by borrowing ahead of the windfall and then accumulating a Sovereign Wealth Fund (SWF) is not optimal for capital-scarce developing economies. Such countries should accumulate public and private capital to accelerate their development and, only if the windfall is large relative to initial foreign debt, is it optimal to build a SWF. The optimal time profile of consumption is biased towards the near future, as compared to the permanent income hypothesis. Outcomes depend on instruments available to government. We study cases where the government can make lump-sum transfers to consumers; where such transfers are impossible so optimal policy involves cutting distortionary taxation in order to raise investment and wages; and where Ricardian consumers can borrow against future revenues, in which case the policy response to possible over-consumption is a high level of investment in infrastructure.

natural resource revenue, windfall public revenues, risk premium on foreign debt, public infrastructure, private investment, credit constraints, optimal fiscal policy, debt management, Sovereign Wealth Fund, asset holding subsidy, developing economies

Abstract:
A model is constructed in which multinational firms may arise endogenously. Multinationals exist in equilibrium when transport and tariff costs are high, incomes are high, and firm-level scale economies are important relative to plant-level scale economies. Less obvious, multinationals are more important in total economic activity when countries are more similar in incomes, relative factor endowments, and technologies. The model may thus be useful in explaining several stylized facts, including (a) the growing importance of direct investment relative to trade among the developed countries over time and (b) the greater ratio of investment to trade among the developed countries relative to this ratio for 'north-south' or 'south-south' economic relationships. The model offers predictions about the volume of trade that contrast with those of the 'new trade theory', predicting that trade at first rises and then falls as countries converge in incomes, relative endowments, and technologies. Welfare is also considered, and it is shown that direct investment makes the smaller (or high cost) country better off, but may make the larger (or low cost) country worse off.

Abstract:
This paper is an effort to do international trade theory without mentioning countries. Nearly all models of the international economy assume that trade takes place between nations or regions which are themselves dimensionless points. We develop a model in which economic space is instead assumed to be continuous, and in which this 'seamless world' spontaneously organizes itself into industrial and agricultural zones because of the tension between forces of agglomeration and disagglomeration. One might expect such a model to be analytically intractable, but we are able to gain considerable insight through a combination of simulations and an analytical approach originally suggested in a biological context by Alan Turing.

Abstract:
We consider a trade model combining a 2x2x2 Heckscher-Ohlin structure, monopolistic competition, transport costs, and multinational corporations. We demonstrate how the mix of national and multinational firms that operate in equilibrium depends on technology and on the division of the world endowment between countries. Multinationals are more likely to exist the more similar are countries in both relative and absolute endowments. Where multinationals exist they reduce the volume of trade and raise world welfare (although not necessarily that of both countries). They also reduce the agglomeration forces that arise when international factor mobility is allowed.

Abstract:
This paper studies the size and number of industrial clusters that arise in a multi-country world in which one sector has a propensity to cluster because of increasing returns to scale. Equilibrium will generally have smaller clusters than the world welfare optimum, and possibly too many countries with a cluster. Countries have an incentive to use policy to attract an industrial cluster, but the equilibrium of the policy game between governments coincides with the world optimum so there is no "race to the bottom". Capping subsidy rates would lead to a proliferation of too many and too small clusters.

Abstract:
This Paper studies the size and number of industrial clusters that will arise in a multi-country world in which, because of increasing returns to scale, one sector has a propensity to cluster. It compares the equilibrium with the world welfare maximum, showing that the equilibrium will generally have clusters that are too small, while there are possibly too many countries with a cluster. Allowing national governments to subsidize will move the equilibrium to the world welfare maximum, so there is no 'race to the bottom'. If subsidy rates were capped then there would be a proliferation of too many and too small clusters.

Clusters, trade, increasing returns, industrial policy

Abstract:
This Paper surveys the empirical literature on the economic geography of trade flows, factor prices, and the location of production. The discussion is structured around the empirical predictions of a canonical theoretical model. We review empirical evidence on the determinants of trade costs and the effects of these costs on trade flows. Geography is a major determinant of factor prices, and access to foreign markets alone is shown to explain some 35% of the cross-country variation in per capita income. The Paper documents empirical findings of home market (or magnification) effects, suggesting that imperfectly competitive industries are drawn more than proportionately to locations with good market access. Sub-national evidence establishes the presence of industrial clustering, and we examine the roles played by product market linkages to customer and supplier firms, knowledge spillovers, and labour market externalities.

Economic geography, international trade, location of production, income inequality

Abstract:
An important element of the cost of distance is time taken in delivering final and intermediate goods. We argue that time costs are qualitatively different from direct monetary costs such as freight charges. The difference arises because of uncertainty. Unsynchronised deliveries can disrupt production, and delivery time can force producers to order components before demand and cost uncertainties are resolved. Using several related models we show that this generates hitherto unexplored incentives for clustering. If final assembly takes place in two locations and component production has increasing returns to scale, then component production will tend to cluster around just one of the assembly plants.

Institutional subscribers to the NBER working paper series, and residents of developing countries may download this paper without additional charge at www.nber.org.

Abstract:
An important element of the cost of distance is time taken in delivering final and intermediate goods. We argue that time costs are qualitatively different from direct monetary costs such as freight charges. The difference arises because of uncertainty. Unsynchronized deliveries can disrupt production, and delivery time can force producers to order components before demand and cost uncertainties are resolved. Using several related models we show that this can cause clustering of component production. If final assembly takes place in two locations and component production has increasing returns to scale, then component production will tend to cluster around just one of the assembly plants.

Just-in-time, clustering, location, trade

Abstract:
How are the benefits and costs of a customs union divided between member countries? Outcomes depend on the comparative advantage of members, relative to each other and relative to the rest of the world. Countries with a comparative advantage between that of their partners and the rest of the world do better than countries with an 'extreme' comparative advantage. Consequently, integration between low income countries tends to lead to divergence of member country incomes, while agreements between high income countries cause convergence. Results suggest that developing countries are likely to be better served by 'north-south' than by 'south-south' agreements.

Abstract:
Adapting our earlier model of multinationals, we address policy issues involving wages and labor skills. Multinational firms may arise endogenously, exporting their firm-specific knowledge capital to foreign production facilities, and geographically fragmenting production into skilled and unskilled-labor-intensive activities. Multinationals thus alter the nature of trade, from trade in goods (produced with both skilled and unskilled labor) to trade in skilled-labor-intensive producer services. Results shed light on several policy questions. First, multinationals increase the skilled/unskilled wage gap in the high income country and, under some circumstances, in the low income country as well. Second, there is a sense in which multinationals export low skilled jobs to the lower income country. Third, trade barriers do not protect unskilled labor in the high income countries. By inducing a regime shift to multinationals, trade barriers protect the abundant factor, at least in the high income country and possibly in both countries. Fourth, a convergence in country characteristics induces the entry of multinationals and raises the skilled-unskilled wage gap in the initially large and skilled-labor-abundant country, and possibly in the small skilled-labor-scarce country as well.

Abstract:
This Paper uses bilateral trade data for OECD countries at the 3-digit industry level to investigate the geography of intra-industry trade (IIT). IIT diminishes with distance and much of the existing empirical literature suggests that this is an inherent characteristic of such trade, arguing that trade in sectors intensive in IIT is choked off rapidly by distance. We show that the dependence of IIT on geography arises not because of any inherent feature of the effects of distance on such trade, but because of the spatial structure of countries' supply and demand characteristics; close countries do a lot of IIT because they have similar economic structures.

Intra-industry trade, trade structure, geography, transport costs

Abstract:
Monetary union is likely to change the spatial structure of economic activity in the EU. This article reviews what is known about these effects and discusses the implications for EMU. We argue that EMU is likely to promote a modest increase in specialization amongst EU countries, although industry-specific shocks are sufficiently small for this not to pose further difficulties for macroeconomic management. Improvements in market access are likely to raise income levels in insiders relative to outsiders. Taking a very long-term view, the urban structure of the EU might be expected to become more polarized, developing a steeper size distribution.

Abstract:
No abstract available.

Abstract:
This article provides a decomposition of the welfare impact on the UK arising from the changes in manufacturing trade consequent upon joining the EC. The methodology employed is that of computable general equilibrium (CGE) modelling, where the underlying model is based on trade under imperfect competition with firms producing under conditions of increasing returns to scale. CGE models can be seen as providing numerical illustrations of theory, or as empirical tools providing estimates of policies. A second aim of this article is then to asses the extent to which CGE models can be used as serious tools of policy analysis. We examine this by assessing the success of the model in replicating counterfactual outcomes. The results indicate (i) that the model does reasonably well in replicating complex reality and that such models can be empirically useful; (ii) that a substantial portion of the welfare impact is attributed to distortions associated with imperfect competition, and that the impact is potentially quite large.

Abstract:
This paper examines city formation in a country whose urban population is growing steadily over time, with new cities required to accommodate this growth. In contrast to most of the literature there is immobility of housing and urban infrastructure, and investment in these assets is taken on the basis of forward-looking behavior. In the presence of these fixed assets cities form sequentially, without the population swings in existing cities that arise in current models, but with swings in house rents. Equilibrium city size, absent government, may be larger or smaller than is efficient, depending on how urban externalities vary with population. Efficient formation of cities with internalization of externalities involves local government intervention and borrowing to finance development. The paper explores the institutions required for successful local government intervention.

Abstract:
This Paper uses NUTS3 sub-regional data for Great Britain to analyze the determinants of spatial variations in income and productivity. We decompose the spatial variation of earnings into a productivity effect and an occupational composition effect. For the former (but not the latter), we find a robust relationship with proximity to economic mass, suggesting that doubling the population of working age proximate to an area is associated with a 3.5% increase in productivity in the area. We measure proximity by travel time, and show that effects decline steeply with time, ceasing to be important beyond approximately 80 minutes.

Regional disparities, productivity, clustering

Abstract:
In this paper we develop a framework to assess the economic impact of foreign investment projects. If investment projects interact with other industries in the host economy, either by buying inputs locally or by selling their own product to local downstream firms, they can create sectoral linkages. The expansion of upstream and downstream industries can feed back to the project's own industry leading to a further expansion of the local industry. We study the circumstances under which investment projects lead to the creation of sectoral linkages and characterize the factors that determine the project's welfare impact. We link analytical findings to case studies undertaken for the EBRD.

Abstract:
This paper argues that the contribution of trade preferences to economic development needs to be reappraised in light of the growth of globalized trade in manufactures. Trade preferences may be able to act as a catalyst for manufacturing exports, leading to rapid growth in exports and employment. To do so, preferences need to be designed to be consistent with international trade in fragmented 'tasks' (as opposed to complete products) and need to be open to countries with sufficient levels of complementary inputs such as skills and infrastructure. Recent experience with the African Growth and Opportunities Act shows that, in the right conditions, Sub-Saharan African countries have had large manufacturing export supply response to trade preferences.

AGOA, EBA, export diversification, rules of origin, Trade preferences

Abstract:
This paper argues that the contribution of trade preferences to economic development needs to be reappraised in light of the growth of globalised trade in manufactures. Trade preferences may be able to act as a catalyst for manufacturing exports, leading to rapid growth in exports and employment. To do so, preferences need to be designed to be consistent with international trade in fragmented tasks (as opposed to complete products) and need to be open to countries with sufficient levels of complementary inputs such as skills and infrastructure. Recent experience with the African Growth and Opportunities Act shows that, in the right conditions, Sub-Saharan African countries have had large manufacturing export supply response to trade preferences.

Abstract:
This Paper examines city formation in a country whose urban population is growing steadily over time, with new cities required to accommodate this growth. In contrast to most of the literature, there is immobility of housing and urban infrastructure, and investment in these assets is taken on the basis of forward-looking behavior. In the presence of these fixed assets, cities form sequentially, without the population swings in existing cities that arise in current models. Equilibrium city size, absent government, may be larger or smaller than is efficient, depending on how urban externalities vary with population. Efficient formation of cities involves local government borrowing to finance development. The institutions governing land markets, leases, local taxation, and local borrowing and debt affect the efficiency of outcomes. The Paper explores the effects of different fiscal constraints, and shows that borrowing constraints lead cities to be larger than is efficient.

Urbanization, city size, urban developers, city governance

Abstract:
A windfall of foreign aid or natural resource revenue faces government with choices of how to manage public borrowing, public asset accumulation, and the distribution of funds to households (across time and household types), particularly when the windfall is both anticipated and temporary. These choices are acute if some households do not have access to credit markets and are unable to smooth consumption, and if the country as a whole is not a price-taker in international capital markets - both reasonable descriptions of many developing countries experiencing resource (or aid) booms. We analyse the optimal policy actions for countries in this position and show that the usual permanent income hypothesis prescription of engineering a permanent increase in consumption financed by borrowing ahead of the windfall and then accumulating a Sovereign Wealth Fund (SWF) is not optimal. Heavily indebted countries with a small windfall should both increase current consumption and accumulate capital to accelerate their development. Only if the windfall is large relative to initial debt is it optimal to build a SWF. We study the intricate dynamic trade-offs faced when using the windfall to pay off debt and possibly accumulate a SWF, build public infrastructure and hand out citizen dividends. Finally, we show that a more sophisticated range of instruments (e.g., an asset holding subsidy) makes the trade-offs easier.

asset holding subsidy, credit constraints, debt management, developing economies, optimal fiscal policy, private investment, public infrastructure, risk premium on foreign debt, Sovereign Wealth Fund, windfall public revenues

Abstract:
We develop a diagrammatic framework that can be used to study the economic linkages between regions or cities. Hitherto, such linkages have not been the primary focus of either the theoretical or empirical literatures. We use the framework to analyse the impact of shocks that occur in one region (eg productivity improvements or increases in housing supply) on other regions, highlighting the key adjustment mechanisms and their long run implications for incomes, the cost of living, and the spatial distribution of population. Our general approach provides a framework encompassing both the New Economic Geography and Urban Systems literatures. We link our approach to these literatures and review empirical studies that quantify the key mechanisms that we have identified.

New Economic Geography, Spatial linkages, Urban and regional policy, Urban systems

Abstract:
Despite a diminishing role in industrial countries, the manufacturing sector continues to be an engine of economic growth in most developing countries. This article surveys the evidence on the determinants of industry location in developing countries. It also employs micro data for India and Indonesia to illustrate recent spatial dynamics of manufacturing relocation within urban agglomerations. Both theory and empirical evidence suggest that agglomeration benefits, market access, and infrastructure endowments in large cities outweigh the costs of congestion, higher wages, and land prices. Despite this evidence, many countries have tried to encourage industrial firms to locate in secondary cities or other lagging areas. Cross-country evidence suggests that fiscal incentives to do so rarely succeed. They appear to influence business location decisions among comparable locations, but the result may be a negative-sum game between regions and inefficiently low tax rates, which prevent public goods from being funded at sufficiently high levels. Relocation tends to be within and between agglomerations rather than from large cities to smaller cities or lagging regions. Rather than provide subsidies and tax breaks, policymakers should focus on streamlining laws and regulations to make the business environment more attractive.

O18, R12, R38

Abstract:
Where imports are financed predominantly by rents from resource extraction or aid, the revenue generated by tariffs is illusory. Revenue earned by the tariff is offset by a reduction in the real value of aid and resource rents. Revenue is however moved between accounts in the government budget, which, in the case of aid, may reduce the burden of donor conditionality. We demonstrate this proposition and its qualifications analytically and by simulating the effects of tariffs on revenue, real income, and export diversification for a range of cases. Whereas countries in which tariff revenue is illusory should adopt more liberal trade regimes, we show that currently there is no such tendency.

Aid, import tariffs, natural resources

Abstract:
We consider a model with a continuum of industries in which agglomeration forces cause each industry to concentrate in a single country. We study the division of industries between countries and show that this division is not unique, so that even with identical countries and symmetric industries the number of industries in each country need not be equal. Unequal divisions are sustainable as equilibria, even though they imply different wages in the two countries, and we find the bounds on the set of equilibrium divisions. With Ricardian differences in technology, there are equilibria in which industries operate in the country in which they have a comparative disadvantage. In both cases, a country may gain by using policy to grab a higher proportion of world industry.