Marshallian Agglomeration Economies and Entrepreneurship: The Spanish Case

38 Pages Posted: 25 Jul 2012

Date Written: June 2, 2011

Abstract

This paper analyzes to what extent Marshallian agglomeration economies affect the creation of new entrepreneurial ventures at the metropolitan level. The measuring of agglomeration economies is based on the construction of indexes using the methodology of Glaeser and Kerr (2009). The indexes attempt to capture the effects of resource sharing, labor matching and knowledge spillovers according to the taxonomy proposed by Marshall (1920). Also an index to measure the influence of small suppliers to attract new business ventures, following Chinitz (1961), is constructed. Data on new firms and employment generated is accounted for the period 2000-2008. The analysis is based on the activity of the 15 largest metropolitan areas in Spain. Sixty industries at two-digit CNAE-93 are considered. The results show that jobs created by entrepreneurs are highly influenced by the ability to share suppliers and customers. Firm creation is influenced by those factors as well as the presence of small suppliers and the proximity to innovative activity. Agglomeration indexes with sector and city fixed effects explain more than 90% of new entry and employment generated. The potential multicollinearity among indexes is tested using principal component analysis. This analysis shows some complementarities among the indexes. New regressions using the factorized terms show that traditional measures of localization economies hide specific information about the process of agglomeration.

Keywords: entrepreneurship, industrial organization, agglomeration, labor markets, input-output flows, innovative

JEL Classification: J23, L26, L60, L70, L80, L90, O31, R39

Suggested Citation

Dopeso-Fernández, Roberto, Marshallian Agglomeration Economies and Entrepreneurship: The Spanish Case (June 2, 2011). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2099183 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2099183

Roberto Dopeso-Fernández (Contact Author)

Universitat Pompeu Fabra, ESCSET ( email )

Av. Ernest Lluch, 32
Edifici TCM1, 2nd Floor, Office 3
Mataró (Barcelona), 08302
Spain
931696500 (Phone)

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