urbanization and poverty reduction the role of rural diversification and secondary towns a rather unique panel tracking more than 3 300 individuals from households in rural kagera tanzania during 1991 4 2010 shows that about one in two individuals households who exited poverty did so by transitioning from agriculture into the rural nonfarm economy or secondary towns only one in seven exited poverty by migrating to a large city although those moving to a city experienced on average faster consumption growth further analysis of a much larger cross country panel of 51 developing countries cannot reject that rural diversification and secondary town development lead to more inclusive growth patterns than metropolitization indications are that this follows because more of the poor find their way to the rural nonfarm economy and secondary towns than to distant cities the development discourse would benefit from shifting beyond the rural urban dichotomy and focusing instead more on how best to urbanize and develop the rural nonfarm economy and secondary towns

regression based measure of urban sprawl for italian municipalities using dmsp ols night time light images and economic data night time light can be used in order to evaluate the degree of urbanization and urban sprawl in a specific territory in fact at the local level the lower the urban density the higher the per c

housing markets in third world cities research and policy into the 1990s abstract a review of analyses of urban housing markets is timely to suggest directions for research and policy in the next decade the neoclassical approach to housing economics is contrasted with a political economy framework with respect to the production or supply of housing and consumption or demand an argument is advanced for increased attention to the analysis of citywide housing markets using insights from both theoretical approaches and for research into processes of exchange such analyses should form the basis for policies which focus neither on selected income groups or residential areas in isolation from wider housing market processes nor on housing output targets but primarily on ensuring the provision of essential inputs

the contribution of environmental amenities to low income housing a comparative study of bangkok and jakarta central and local governments and their creditors are increasingly interested in cost recovery for public services these strategies have two aims increasing revenues and making a better connection between benefits received and consumer bills this paper estimates a hedonic model for household level data in a rare contrast of slums in two asian mega cities to provide comparative information about how the poor value environmental amenities and basic infrastructure access the results suggest that slum housing prices do reflect differentials in public service access and that rough estimates of the value of access can be cheaply and usefully obtained for planning purposes

economic geography and wages abstract this paper estimates the agglomeration benefits that arise from vertical linkages between firms we identify the agglomeration benefits off the spatial variation in firms nominal wages u

evidence on the political economy of the urbanization process urbanization and economic development go hand in hand as a country moves from a rural agricultural base to an urban industrial base this paper argues that urbanization per se occurs in response to the basic sector shift out of agriculture and government policies such as price controls and trade protection of industry affect the process only indirectly through their effect on sector composition however urban concentration the extent to which a country s urban resources are concentrated in one or two large cities as opposed to more evenly spread is much more directly affected by policies and politics the paper finds specifically that investments in inter regional infrastructure facilitates urban deconcentration away from primate to hinterland cities as does increasing democratization or increasing fiscal decentralization the findings move beyond establishing basic correlations in the data to trying to quantify causal effects in a panel framework with instrumental variables estimation

estimating the intrahousehold incidence of illness child health and gender inequality in the allocation of time in this paper the authors develop and implement a method for estimating the effects of infant morbidity on the differential allocation of time of family members based on discrete indicators of health and activity participation commonly available in survey data and within the context of a household model in which health is determined endogenously their estimates that take into account the simultaneity of health activity associations indicate that increased levels of infant morbidity significantly exacerbate existing differentials in the accumulation of human capital across teenage boys and girls in indonesia copyright 1990 by economics department of the university of pennsylvania and the osaka university institute of social and economic research association

industrial centralization in indonesia in certain situations economic liberalization policies can increase the degree of spatial centralization of resources and spatial concentration of manufacturing in large metropolitan areas in addition historical patterns of location make it difficult to alter the degree of centralization this article explores these issues by specifying and estimating a nested logit model of industrial location of manufacturing activity in java focusing on the unincorporated sector the results indicate that plants strongly prefer locations with mature plants in related industries which offer a built up stock of local knowledge in addition the 1983 liberalization in indonesia was associated with increased centralization of the unincorporated sector although the liberalization gave unincorporated firms better access to government and other centralized services firms needed to centralize to take advantage of these opportunities because the bureaucratic process is centralized and communications are poor the relative increased growth of the corporate sector following liberalization may also have helped to further draw unincorporated plants into centralized locations

what impact does the choice of formula have on international comparisons in this paper an empirical comparison of a number of alternative multilateral index number formulae is undertaken the magnitude of the effect of choosing one formula over another is ascertained using an appropriate cross sectional data set constructed under the auspices of the eurostat oecd purchasing power parity programme to this end a new indicator is proposed that facilitates the measurement of the difference between two sets of bloc consumption shares each computed using a different multilateral comparison method jel classification c31 c43 c81 e31 f31 o57 quel impact est ce que le choix des formules a sur les comparaisons internationales ce memoire propose une comparaison empirique d un certain nombre de formules de nombres indices multilateraux on tente de jauger la magnitude de l impact du choix d une formule plutot qu une autre en utilisant une base de donnees transversales appropriee construite sous l egide du programme de parite du pouvoir d achat eurostat ocde on propose un nouvel indicateur qui facilite la mesure de la difference entre deux ensembles de patterns de consommation chacun calculea l aide d une methode de comparaison multilaterale differente

national versus sectoral shocks new evidence for the manufacturing sector in european countries abstract using data for european countries from 1976 to 1998 this paper shows that the relative importance of country specific shocks versus common sectoral shocks has reduced considerably during the most recent years probably as a result of more intense policy co ordination

urban squatting and community organization in developing countries abstract it is estimated that up to 30 35 percent of the total urban population of the third world about 185 million people live in squatter settlements this paper presents from an economic perspective of tenure choice under uncertainty a unified and consistent theoretical framework of this phenomenon which has heretofore been studied mainly by other social scientists the model is able to explain why land invasions occur furthermore it provides some insights as to why the number of squatters in an urban area depends on a squatter community s ability to form coalitions to fully protect its members rights it is shown in the paper that if a community is successful in controlling its size government efforts which are meant to reduce the number of squatters may lead to the opposite results in particular the imposition of heavier fines or the increase of government expenditures on eviction activity threat campaigns eviction in other jurisdictions etc will likely lead to an increase in the optimal number of squatters unless the decline in expected utility caused by these efforts is so great that squatting no longer becomes viable at any community size

measuring the welfare effects of slum improvement programs the case of mumbai this paper evaluates the welfare effects of in situ slum upgrading and relocation programs using data for 5000 households in mumbai india we estimate a model of residential location choice in which households value the ethnic composition of neighborhoods and employment accessibility in addition to housing characteristics the importance of neighborhood composition and employment access implies that relocation programs must be designed carefully if they are to be welfare enhancing the value of our model is that it allows us to determine the magnitude of these effects it also allows us to determine the value households place on in situ improvements which policymakers need to know if they are to design housing programs that permit cost recovery

user cost and housing tenure in developing countries abstract this paper reports on research conducted at the world bank to increase understanding of developing country housing markets in particular of housing demand behavior the objectives of the paper are 1 to briefly review recent evidence on housing demand parameters in developing countries including new estimates for colombia egypt el salvador ghana india jamaica korea and the philippines and 2 to examine similarities and differences among cities in housing demand the analysis emphasizes differences in housing demand by tenure particularly for renters and owners but also for squatters and non squatters and paralleling the literature in developed countries stresses the importance of accounting for the impact of income and relative prices on housing demand

the effect of financial liberalization on the capital structure and investment decisions of indonesian manufacturing establishments this article analyzes the consequences of financial liberalization using a large panel of indonesian manufacturing establishments it discusses whether financial reforms have had an impact on investment and on the allocation of credit and whether the effects differ depending on the type of firms the overall conclusion is that shifting from administrative toward market based allocation of credit has increased borrowing cost particularly for smaller firms but at the same time has benefited firms by giving them widened access to finance

industrial location in post reform india patterns of inter regional divergence and intra regional convergence where do new industrial investments locate and what factors drive the industrial location decisions do these investments follow the model of divergence followed by convergence suggested by the cumulative causation agglomeration economies and transport costs approaches these questions are examined with district level data from india for the pre and post reform periods using first tables and maps of concentration and clustering aggregated for all industry and disaggregated into five sectors heavy industries chemicals and petroleum textiles agribusiness and utilities and second logistic and ols heckman selection regression models for these six elements the data provide solid evidence both of inter regional divergence and intra regional convergence and suggest that concentrated decentralisation is the appropriate framework for understanding industrial location in post reform india

the role of international factors in the business cycle a multi country study abstract empirical research has been conducted on the various theories of the business cycle over many countries however very little research has attempted to undertake a multi country disaggregate investigation into the sources of output change this paper decomposes fluctuations in industry output in a particular country into 1 a nation specific shock 2 an industry specific shock 3 a common shock and 4 an idiosyncratic factor using a dynamic factor analysis state space approach the paper finds that the industry specific impulse explains a significant but small part of the variance of the forecast error this provides limited support for the disaggregated real business cycle paradigm

theory and estimation in the economics of housing demand the main purpose of this paper is to review recent theoretical and empirical developments in the economics of housing demand in particular we ask what is known concerning the permanent income elasticity of housing demand vis a vis the current or measured income elasticity what is known concerning price elasticities what is the appropriate functional form for housing demand equations what is the role of demographic variables what is known concerning dynamic aspects of housing demand what appear to be the major sources of bias in existing estimates of demand equations

does inflation affect real behavior the case of housing an important tradition in economics is to assume that demand depends upon relative prices and is homogenous of degree zero for the most part this has been interpreted as meaning inflation changes in the price level leaves demand unchanged recent work by a number of economists has challenged this position for the case of housing demand two arguments have been made that inflation acting in concert with existing institutions alters the quantity of housing demanded and the decision to rent or own a house the first argument states that inflation and the standard fixed payment mortgage combine to reduce the size of the mortgage loan a household can obtain for the purpose of buying a home this works to reduce the quantity of owner occupied housing demanded given the importance of mortgage finance to the demand for owner occupied housing the second argument focuses on the inflation adjusted after tax cost of owner occupied housing it simply states that an increase in the rate of anticipated inflation of the general price level reduces the after tax cost of housing thus increasing the demand for housing and the demand for homeownership there has been little empirical testing of these two arguments the purpose of this paper is to formulate and estimate a model which will give an indication of the quantitative significance of the two arguments a housing demand equation and a tenure choice equation own versus rent are estimated using a sample of about 6000 households from the 1975 annual housing survey 10 the estimates suggest that inflation dampens housing demand and homeownership opportunity for most households even though the inflation adjusted after tax cost of owner occupied housing declines as inflation heats up the paper consists of six sections including the introduction section two examines the ways inflation affects housing choices in more detail the third section contains the specification of the econometric model that forms the basis of the study section four is a discussion of econometric problems and the data used the results of the estimates are discussed in the fifth section the paper concludes with a presentation of the major conclusions and policy implications of the study

identifying spatial efficiency equity tradeoffs in territorial development policies evidence from uganda abstractwe contribute to the debate on the spatial allocation of infrastructure investments by examining where these investments generate the highest economic return spatial efficiency and identifying trade offs when infrastructure coverage is made more equitable across regions spatial equity we estimate models of firm location choice in uganda drawing on insights from the new economic geography literature the main findings show that manufacturing firms gain from being in areas that offer a diverse mix of economic activities public infrastructure investments in other locations are likely to attract fewer private investors and will pose a spatial efficiency equity trade off

exclusionary policies in urban development under servicing migrant households in brazilian cities localities in developed countries often enact regulations to deter low income households from moving in in developing countries such restrictions lead to the emergence of informal housing sectors to deter low income migrants localities in developing countries withhold public services to the informal housing sector using a large sample of brazilian localities we examine migration and exclusion focusing on the public provision of water to small houses where low income migrants are likely to live withholding water connections reduces the locality growth rate particularly of low education households in terms of service provision during dictatorship in brazil we find evidence of strategic exclusion where localities appear to withhold services to deter in migration we also find evidence of strategic interactions among localities within metro areas in their setting of service levels if one locality provides more services to migrant households other localities respond by withholding service

european financial market dependence an industry analysis this paper uses a copula model to investigate the degree and determinants of european market dependence across 10 industries in 12 euro zone and 8 non euro zone stock markets during the period 1992 2011 most of the industries in euro countries show a dependence increase with the euro area after the introduction of the euro the effects are strongest in countries with larger market capitalization and in the financials industrials consumer goods utilities technology and telecommunications industries overall the export intensity interest rate sensitivity and competitiveness of an industry and the financial development and economic openness of a country are the most important determinants of changes in equity market dependence the period around the lehman collapse also shows higher equity market dependence between european countries while the lower dependence increase during the period of the recent european sovereign debt crisis suggests that country specific factors may matter more than before

privatization and economic growth an empirical investigation from a sample of developing market economies this paper explores the economic determinants of privatization programmes and the macroeconomic impact of this institutional reform on the growth rate of the gdp a sample of thirty five developing market economies is considered over the 1988 92 period probit and tobit models are used to identify the determinants of successful privatization programmes then regressions are run where probabilities probit and expected values tobit are successively included as additional regressors beside the potential influence of other economic policy variables a significant positive effect is highlighted giving evidence of the importance of divestiture the economic effect is found to be stronger when this institutional reform took place in industry or infrastructure

an exogeneity test for a simultaneous equation tobit model with an application to labor supply a test of weak exogeneity in the simultaneous equation tobit model is proposed and illustrated using a female labour supply model estimated using cross section data the test statistic can be simply output from any standard tobit maximum likelihood package and is asymptotically efficient the procedure provides consistent estimators for the simultaneous tobit model whose asymptotic covariance matrix is a simple extension of the usual tobit formula we also provide the lagrange multiplier test of weak exogeneity this abstract was borrowed from another version of this item

world product and income international comparisons of real gross product the volume reports on the third phase of the united nations international comparison project icp the main results provide comparisons of real gross domestic product gdp per capita for thirty four countries in 1975 quantity and price comparisons are given also for personal consumption capital formation and public consumption and further subdivisions of final expenditures on gdp are estimated

tenure security and urban squatting while recent studies have shown that up to 35 of the total urban population of the third world live in squatter settlements there is a dearth of economic analysis on the phenomenon of squatting this paper attempts to fill this gap the equilibrium model argues that the difference in unit housing prices between the non squatting formal sector of a city and its squatting informal sector reflects the premium associated with a secure tenure status the empirical portion of this paper uses hedonic price techniques to derive the average premium on tenure security in a medium sized philippine city davao results show that formal sector unit dwelling prices are about 18 renters to 58 owners more than in the informal sector these equilibrium price differentials were found to be greater for lower income groups larger household sizes and households with older heads for renters and younger heads for