Economic activity tends to cluster. This results in productivity gains. For policy makers this offers an opportunity to formulate and promote policies that foster clustering of economic activity. Paradoxically, although agglomeration rents are often found in empirical research a rationale for...

The literature on China indicates that the concentration of economic activities in China is less than in other industrialized countries. Institutional limits are largely held responsible for this finding (e.g. the Hukou system); firms and workers are not able to take full advantage of the...

With the availability of international value added trade data it has become evident that gross export data and value added data do not provide the same information. Although gross exports crosses national borders and is the target of trade policy, value added data tell us what fragment in the...

The research on the location choice for Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) is traditionally restricted to a choice between countries. The within-country location choice is less prominent in the literature. If within-country location decisions are considered it is mostly limited to Greenfield...

With the completion of EMU, tax competition and, more in general, locational competition is high on the EU policy agenda. In contrast to the standard neo-classical reasoning, recent advances in the theory of trade and location have shown that tax competition does not necessarily lead to a...

The literature on international transfers largely ignores the fact that transfers are often given in the form of money. We analyze both the welfare consequences of financial transfers for the donor and the recipient, and their impact on the current account. Under normal circumstances transfer...

With the completion of EMU, tax competition and, more in general, locational competition is high on the EU policy agenda. In contrast to the standard neo-classical reasoning, recent advances in the theory of trade and location have shown that tax competition does not necessarily lead to a...

By combining two large data sets (on international trade flows and cross-border mergers and acquisitions – M&As), we test two implications of Neary’s (2003, 2007) general oligopolistic equilibrium (GOLE) model (incorporating strategic interaction between firms in a general equilibrium...

By combining two large data sets (on international trade flows and cross-border mergers and acquisitions – M&As), we test two implications of Neary’s (2003, 2007) general oligopolistic equilibrium (GOLE) model (incorporating strategic interaction between firms in a general equilibrium...