Regional Studies

Bournakis, Ioannis; Papanastassiou, Marina; Pitelis, Christos

doi: 10.1080/00343404.2018.1447661pmid: N/A

The paper explores the respective effects of multinational enterprises (MNEs) and domestic enterprises (DOMEs) on regional productivity in the case of UK regions. The empirical evidence shows that the more intensive in terms of research and development and intangibles, MNEs have a stronger effect on regional productivity than DOMEs. However, when one controls for the origin of the MNEs, it is found that DOMEs can outperform MNEs from certain countries. It is submitted that regions that lag behind can absorb the intangible assets of DOMEs more readily; and that MNE strategies may not be always aligned to the needs of host regions.

Beer, Andrew; Ayres, Sarah; Clower, Terry; Faller, Fabian; Sancino, Alessandro; Sotarauta, Markku

doi: 10.1080/00343404.2018.1447662pmid: N/A

This paper examines the leadership of places – cities, regions, communities – in Australia, Finland, Germany, Italy, the United States and the United Kingdom and explores the capacity of vignettes to generate new, theoretical and empirical insights. It uses vignettes to identify the features of place leadership evident in 12 case studies across six nations. The research finds significant commonalities in place leadership with respect to the importance attached to boundary spanning, the role of government officials in responding to the prospect of regional decline or growth and how the nature of the challenge confronting a locality determines the adequacy of the response.

Arieli, Tamar

doi: 10.1080/00343404.2018.1453129pmid: N/A

Intermunicipal cooperation (IMC) in regions of social–economic and cultural heterogeneity may facilitate economies of scale and improve competitiveness and service delivery, but the insights of border and regional studies reveal its limitations in addressing disparities and generating development. This paper analyzes IMC prospects within peripheral regions of Israel, where municipal borders mark divides of prosperity, ethnicity and religion. Israeli policy promotes regionalism through IMC to facilitate intra-regional interdependence and development. Yet, institutionalized structures of cooperation have minimal impact on intra-regional disparities. Pervasive social borders undermine the prospects of IMC, as an insufficient substitute for necessary government investment in addressing historic roots of socioeconomic inequality.

Okulicz-Kozaryn, Adam; Valente, Rubia R.

doi: 10.1080/00343404.2018.1453130pmid: N/A

Urban malaise or unhappiness with city life is common in developed countries. City dwellers, particularly those in the largest metropolitan areas, are reported to be the least satisfied with their lives. Using the US General Social Survey (1972–2016), this paper explores the latest happiness trends. The results confirm earlier findings of urban malaise: Americans in general are happiest in smaller cities and rural areas. However, the advantage of rural living is declining – rural Americans are becoming less happy relative to urbanites. Most interestingly, the results show that the latest generation, termed ‘Millennials’ (1982–2004), as opposed to earlier generations, are the happiest in large cities (an estimated magnitude larger than earning an additional US$100,000 in family income annually). The possible reasons for this trend are explored and directions for future research are discussed.

Benassi, Federico; Naccarato, Alessia

doi: 10.1080/00343404.2018.1454999pmid: N/A

Taylor’s power law (Tpl) is applied to the human population density of Italian regions and provinces for the period 1971–2011. Three different weighting systems are used to estimate Tpl at the national and subnational levels in which seemingly unrelated regression models are adopted. The following results were found: Tpl is suitable for human populations and sensitive to the adopted weighting system; Tpl’s slope is positive and, at a subnational level, has an inverse behaviour with respect to the spatial variability of the weighting variables; and Tpl’s slope can be viewed as an indicator of a population’s spatial distribution homogeneity.

Filippetti, Andrea; Guy, Frederick; Iammarino, Simona

doi: 10.1080/00343404.2018.1455177pmid: N/A

This paper investigates one particular aspect of human capital formation: the relative effectiveness of training, as reflected in its effect on the probability of securing continued employment during the recent financial crisis. It uses a panel of 3983 individuals for the period 2008–11 and focuses on how the effects of training differ between the South and the North of Italy and across workers with different levels of education. The most striking result is that the effect of training on continued employment is notably stronger in the South than in the North of the country.

Calcagnini, Giorgio; Giombini, Germana; Perugini, Francesco

doi: 10.1080/00343404.2018.1455971pmid: N/A

The funding role of bank foundations in the Italian economy, especially to the non-profit sector, significantly increased over the last 25 years. This paper constructs a novel measure of social capital at the provincial level that explicitly takes into account the bank foundations’ sectors of intervention (such as education, public health, and art and culture), together with other traditional aspects of social capital, and then tests the impact of bank foundations on the economic growth of Italian provinces. The findings suggest that the contribution of bank foundations to social capital positively affects the economic growth of provinces.

Wang, Lili; Jacob, Jojo; Li, Zibiao

doi: 10.1080/00343404.2018.1457216pmid: N/A

This paper investigates the factors driving nanotechnology development in Chinese regions. Advanced regions of China have spearheaded the country’s rapid growth in nanotechnology, aided by substantial support from the government. While this head start could potentially perpetuate regional inequalities through agglomeration economies, the results suggest that knowledge spillovers exert a substantially greater impact in peripheral regions compared with the advanced ones, and may thus be compensating for the limited institutional support they receive and their weak technological capabilities. This research contributes to the regional innovation literature by highlighting that a formal scientific network can counteract the forces of agglomeration economies and spur innovation in peripheral regions.

Conroy, Tessa

doi: 10.1080/00343404.2018.1462478pmid: N/A

This paper tests the effects of children and childcare on women’s employment and entrepreneurial outcomes at the county level for the United States. Given that policies and economic development strategies are often implemented across local and regional jurisdictions, this regional study contributes to the literature by considering access to childcare in relation to locally aggregated female labour market outcomes by sector. The results, which address potential endogeneity, indicate that young children and childcare affect female employment differently depending on the sector. The results are consistent with women choosing the public sector and self-employment over the private sector to accommodate the demands of childrearing.

Horvath, Thomas; Huber, Peter

doi: 10.1080/00343404.2018.1462479pmid: N/A

This paper develops a model based on statistical discrimination theories which predicts that higher educated immigrants have better and less educated immigrants have worse employment prospects in ethnically more diverse regions. Evidence consistent with this hypothesis is found in an empirical analysis. These results, however, also show that even the least educated recent immigrants have higher employment probabilities in ethnically more diverse regions. This suggests that the positive effects of ethnic diversity on overall labour demand compensate for any negative effects on less educated recent immigrants.