The paper analyses the existence and efficiency of discretionary industrial assistance schemes under asymmetric information between an uninformed government and a uniform distribution of firms with differing productivities. Discretionary assistance allows the government to scrutinise projects in...

"3,000 Jobs to go in Motorola Closure", "Black and Decker cuts 1,000 jobs", "Vauxhall axes 2,000", "North-east jobs go as Viasystems fails", "NEC to close Scottish plant", "1,900 jobs to go as Ford confirms closure". These headlines are all taken from a national newspaper over a recent few years...

Abstract Regional economics appears to be losing its currency in academic discourse, with a clear preference over recent years for the term ‘spatial economics’. This essay examines the nature of the developments in order to explore their implications for regional economics, focusing on four...