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Agglomeration Externalities and Productivity Growth: U.S. Cities, 1880-1930

Klein, Alexander, Crafts, Nicholas (2020) Agglomeration Externalities and Productivity Growth: U.S. Cities, 1880-1930. The Economic History Review, 73 (1). pp. 209-232. ISSN 0013-0117. E-ISSN 1468-0289. (doi:10.1111/ehr.12786) (KAR id:69084)

Abstract

We investigate the role of industrial structure in labour productivity growth in manufacturing in U.S. cities during the ‘second industrial revolution’. We find that initially greater specialization was associated with faster subsequent productivity growth but that only the very high levels of diversity which obtained in some very large cities had a positive correlation. We interpret our results as demonstrating the existence of dynamic Marshallian externalities. The impact of industrial specialization in our sample of U.S. cities after 1890 is found to have raised the level of labour productivity in manufacturing by about 4 per cent by 1920.

Item Type: Article
DOI/Identification number: 10.1111/ehr.12786
Uncontrolled keywords: agglomeration externalities; diversity; manufacturing; productivity growth; specialization
Subjects: H Social Sciences
H Social Sciences > HC Economic History and Conditions
Divisions: Divisions > Division of Human and Social Sciences > School of Economics
Depositing User: Alexander Klein
Date Deposited: 12 Sep 2018 17:18 UTC
Last Modified: 09 Dec 2022 06:32 UTC
Resource URI: https://kar.kent.ac.uk/id/eprint/69084 (The current URI for this page, for reference purposes)

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