In this paper we find evidence that the new economic geography approach is able to describe and explain the spatial characteristics of an economy, in our case the German economy. Using German district data we estimate the structural parameters of a new economic geography model as developed by...

Does migration serve as an effective channel of regional adjustment to idiosyncratic shocks in transition economies? If so, one should find a strong relationship between regional unemployment and average wages on the one hand, and migration flows on the other. Yet, the evidence from transition...

Most ‘wage curve’ studies treat local labour markets as independent ‘islands’ in the national economy. However, when a local labour market is in close proximity of other labour markets, a local shock that increases unemployment may not lead to lower pay rates if employers fear outward...

Based on micro-data on individual workers for the period 2000-2005, we show that wage differentials in the Netherlands are small but present. A large part of these differentials can be attributed to individual characteristics of workers. Remaining effects are partially explained by variations in...

The peculiarities of the German system of labor relations suggest, that the efficiency wage hypothesis stating an inverse relation between local wages and local unemployment should be related to sectoral wage bargaining on the national level. For that purpose a theoretical model is presented...

This study presents some stylised facts on wage growth differentials across the euro area countries in the years before and in the first eight years after the introduction of Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) in 1999. The study shows that wage growth dispersion, i.e. the degree of difference in...

Exogenous shocks often impact a local labor market more than at the national level. This study improves upon the standard Difference in Difference (DD) approach by examining exogenous shocks using a Generalized Difference in Difference (GDD) econometric approach that identifies the effects of...