We build a theoretical model that relates house price, city size and the expected future growth of demand for housing. Our model combines the Alonso-Mills model on urban economics with insights from financial economics on house prices. Estimating the model for cities in the US, we empirically...

Should public investment be targeted to big cities or to small towns, if the objective is to minimize national poverty? To answer this policy question we extend the basic Todaro-type model of rural-urban migration to the case of migration from rural areas to two potential destinations, secondary...

Should public investment be targeted to big cities or to small towns, if the objective is to minimize national poverty? To answer this policy question we extend the basic Todaro-type model of rural-urban migration to the case of migration from rural areas to two potential destinations, secondary...

This paper examines how changes in urban industrial network structures explain the growth rates of labor productivity in cities. I formulate a multi-sector general equilibrium model with input-output networks of firms within a city and trade across cities. A key input to this framework is an...

We study decentralized and optimal urbanization in a simple multi-sector model of a rural-urban economy focusing on productivity differences and internal trade frictions. We show that even in the absence of the typical externalities studied in the literature, such as agglomeration, congestion or...

This paper analyzes a closed, essentially linear polycentric city with homogenous households who probabilistically select their workplace and residence locations. The study utilizes a continuous logit model to describe household location choices. In contrast to the classic urban model with...

We provide a political-economy analysis of crime prevention in an arbitrary city in the United States. City residents (voters) elect mayors (politicians) and elected mayors determine the resources to be allocated to crime prevention. Between the two time periods, there is an election....

Will improvements in information technology eliminate face-to- face interactions and make cities obsolete? In this paper, we present a model where individuals make contacts and choose whether to use electronic or face-to-face meetings in their interactions. Cities are modeled as a means of...