DP1523 Growing Locations: Industry Location in a Model of Endogenous Growth

Author(s):	Philippe Martin, Gianmarco Ottaviano
Publication Date:	November 1996
Keyword(s):	Endogenous Growth, New Geography, R&D
JEL(s):	F43, O30, R12
Programme Areas:	International Macroeconomics, International Trade and Regional Economics
Link to this Page:	cepr.org/active/publications/discussion_papers/dp.php?dpno=1523

This paper constructs a model of endogenous growth and endogenous industry location where the two interact. We show that with global spillovers in R&D, a high growth rate and a high level of transaction costs are associated with relocation of the newly created firms to the South (the location with a low initial human capital). With local spillovers in R&D, this activity will be agglomerated in the North and the rate of innovation will increase with the concentration of firms in the North. This in turn implies that a decrease of transaction costs through, for example, trade integration, will increase the growth rate because it leads to a higher industrial concentration of firms where the R&D is located. We show that industrial concentration improves welfare only for low enough transaction costs and high enough spillovers.