Full Citation
Title: Measuring Agglomeration: Products, People, and Ideas in US Manufacturing, 1880-1990
Citation Type: Miscellaneous
Publication Year: 2014
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Abstract: I identify local, inter-industry spillovers net of congestion and competition in US manufacturing over the twentieth century. I do so along four Marshallian industry connectivities: input supplying, output consuming, labor pooling, and ideas collaborating. For identification, I use two major inventionsautomobiles in 1904 and semiconductors in 1958in newly-digitized, city-industry-year level US Census of Manufactures records, 1880-1990. Because the inventions were large, unanticipated demand shocks to supplier industries, the pre-invention supplier share of a citys manufacturing employment is an exogenous measure of the citys invention shock. Hence, a comparison of pre- and post-invention employment between supplier-connected and -unconnected industries, across cities with large versus small pre-invention supplier shares identi- fies the net connectivity spillovers. In the early twentieth century, net connectivity spillovers were near zero, except for negative net output consuming spillovers. In the late twentieth century, net output consuming spillovers attenuated to zero while net labor pooling spillovers became negative. These results are consistent with falling transportation costs, increased occupational specialization, and reduced worker migration. Together, they point to limited and decreasing local, inter-industry productivity spillovers relative to congestion and competition in twentieth century US manufacturing.
Url: http://scholar.harvard.edu/files/jglee/files/mfg_agglom_jgl_draft_2014.11.10.pdf
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Authors: Lee, James
Publisher: Harvard University
Data Collections: IPUMS USA
Topics: Labor Force and Occupational Structure, Other
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