This paper presents a spatial analysis of unemployment rates in Germany. The goal of this analysis is to explain the stubbornly low labor productivity and high unemployment rates in Eastern Germany. We build a model of commuting to distinguish between worker and job characteristics as the main...

This paper presents a spatial analysis of unemployment rates in Germany. The goal of this analysis is to explain the stubbornly low labor productivity and high unemployment rates in Eastern Germany. We build a model of commuting to distinguish between worker and job characteristics as the main...

Empirical evidence for the US shows that migrants increase the productivity of regions. To explain the impact of migrants on the average firm productivity we construct a general equilibrium model with monopolistic competition a la Melitz (2003). We consider heterogeneous firms with different...

Economic debate about the consequences of immigration in Germany has largely focused on the wage effects for natives at an aggregate level. Especially the role of imperfect substitutability of migrants and natives gained importance. A new topic is to focus on the firm level by estimating...

Economic debate about the consequences of immigration in Germany has largely focused on the wage effects for natives at an aggregate level. Especially the role of imperfect substitutability of migrants and natives gained importance. A new micro oriented approach is to focus on the firm level by...

This article reconsiders the empirical evidence on regional human capital externalities using longitudal survey data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP). It complements the empirical literature on the role of human capital for explaining regional wage differences. Based on the framework...

The paper surveys the recent theoretical and empirical literature on the economic determinants of interregional labor migration. In the first part, theoretical approaches are outlined, in the second part, results of several empirical investigations are surveyed. The authors conclude that...

While there is a wealth of literature dealing with the spatial nature of knowledge and its transferral, I argue that the underlying mechanisms have not been sufficiently understood. Existing research relating the geography of inflows to firm productivity does not adequately address firm and...

In cities, complementarity between a low-skilled and a high-skilled workforce can promote each other to improve labor productivity. In this study, we used earlier census data and 1% population survey data to examine the distribution of the skilled workforce in cities in the People's Republic of...