Spatial sorting

Arbeitspapier

We investigate the role of complementarities in production and skill mobility across cities. We propose a general equilibrium model of location choice by heterogeneously skilled workers, and consider different degrees of complementarities between the skills of workers. The nature of the complementarities determines the equilibrium skill distribution across cities. We prove that with extreme-skill complementarity, the skill distribution has fatter tails in large cities; with top-skill complementarity, there is first-order stochastic dominance. Using the model to back out skills from wage and housing price data, we find robust evidence of fat tails in large cities. Big cities have big inequality. This pattern of spatial sorting is consistent with extreme-skill complementarity: the productivity of high skilled workers and of the providers of low skilled services is mutually enhanced.

Angaben zum Objekt

• Sprache: Englisch

Verweise und Beziehungen

• Erschienen in: Series: IFS Working Papers ; No. W13/18

Klassifikation und Themen

• Klassifikation: Wirtschaft
• Thema: complementarity ; cities ; sorting ; price-theoretic measure of skills ; population mobility ; city size ; matching theory ; general equilibrium ; skill distribution

Beteiligte, Orts- und Zeitangaben

• Ereignis: Geistige Schöpfung
• (wer): Eeckhout, Jan ; Pinheiro, Roberto ; Schimdheiny, Kurt
• Ereignis: Veröffentlichung
• (wer): Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS)
• (wo): London
• (wann): 2013

Weitere Informationen

• DOI: doi:10.1920/wp.ifs.2013.1318
• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/91565
• Letzte Aktualisierung: 10.03.2025, 11:41 MEZ