IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ehl/lserod/121453.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Spatial disparities across labour markets

Author

Listed:
  • Overman, Henry G.
  • Xu, Xiaowei

Abstract

We consider disparities across local labour markets in Great Britain. Disparities in wages and employment rates are large and persistent, although smaller than 20 years ago. These disparities largely reflect the concentration of high-skilled workers, who would have better labour market outcomes wherever they live. This concentration is driven by differences in the demand for, and supply of, skills and the self-reinforcing interaction between the two, which is particularly pronounced in the highest-wage areas and at the upper end of the wage distribution. The highest-paid jobs are concentrated in London and a handful of other areas and wage disparities are mostly driven by the higher-paid. Places that offer higher earnings also have higher rents, which may entirely offset gains in earnings. Consistent with this, people in higher-paid places are no happier than those in lower-paid places.

Suggested Citation

  • Overman, Henry G. & Xu, Xiaowei, 2024. "Spatial disparities across labour markets," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 121453, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:121453
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/121453/
    File Function: Open access version.
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Raj Chetty & Nathaniel Hendren, 2018. "The Impacts of Neighborhoods on Intergenerational Mobility II: County-Level Estimates," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 133(3), pages 1163-1228.
    2. Bosquet, Clément & Overman, Henry G., 2019. "Why does birthplace matter so much?," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 26-34.
    3. Carrascal-Incera, Andre & McCann, Philip & Ortega-Argilés, Raquel & Rodríguez-Pose, Andrés, 2020. "Uk Interregional Inequality In A Historical And International Comparative Context," National Institute Economic Review, National Institute of Economic and Social Research, vol. 253, pages 4-17, August.
    4. Richard Blundell & Alan Duncan & Julian McCrae & Costas Meghir, 2000. "The labour market impact of the working families’ tax credit," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 21(1), pages 75-103, March.
    5. Patricia G Rice & Anthony J Venables, 2021. "The persistent consequences of adverse shocks: how the 1970s shaped UK regional inequality," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 37(1), pages 132-151.
    6. Wolfgang Dauth & Sebastian Findeisen & Enrico Moretti & Jens Suedekum, 2022. "Matching in Cities," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 20(4), pages 1478-1521.
    7. Raj Chetty & Nathaniel Hendren, 2018. "The Impacts of Neighborhoods on Intergenerational Mobility I: Childhood Exposure Effects," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 133(3), pages 1107-1162.
    8. Enrico Moretti, 2013. "Real Wage Inequality," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 5(1), pages 65-103, January.
    9. David Autor & David Dorn & Lawrence F Katz & Christina Patterson & John Van Reenen, 2020. "The Fall of the Labor Share and the Rise of Superstar Firms [“Automation and New Tasks: How Technology Displaces and Reinstates Labor”]," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 135(2), pages 645-709.
    10. Eric Chyn & Lawrence F. Katz, 2021. "Neighborhoods Matter: Assessing the Evidence for Place Effects," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 35(4), pages 197-222, Fall.
    11. Alan Manning & Barbara Petrongolo, 2017. "How Local Are Labor Markets? Evidence from a Spatial Job Search Model," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(10), pages 2877-2907, October.
    12. Adam B. Jaffe & Manuel Trajtenberg & Rebecca Henderson, 1993. "Geographic Localization of Knowledge Spillovers as Evidenced by Patent Citations," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 108(3), pages 577-598.
    13. Jorge De La Roca & Diego Puga, 2017. "Learning by Working in Big Cities," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 84(1), pages 106-142.
    14. Duranton, Gilles & Puga, Diego, 2005. "From sectoral to functional urban specialisation," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(2), pages 343-370, March.
    15. Chiara Criscuolo & Ralf Martin & Henry G. Overman & John Van Reenen, 2019. "Some Causal Effects of an Industrial Policy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 109(1), pages 48-85, January.
    16. Gokan, Toshitaka & Kichko, Sergey & Thisse, Jacques-François, 2019. "How do trade and communication costs shape the spatial organization of firms?," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 113(C).
    17. Timothy Besley & Miguel Coelho & John Van Reenen, 2013. "Investing for Prosperity: Skills, Infrastructure and Innovation," National Institute Economic Review, National Institute of Economic and Social Research, vol. 224(1), pages 1-13, May.
    18. Weinhardt, Felix, 2014. "Social housing, neighborhood quality and student performance," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 12-31.
    19. Sandra E. Black & Paul J. Devereux & Kjell G. Salvanes, 2005. "Why the Apple Doesn't Fall Far: Understanding Intergenerational Transmission of Human Capital," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(1), pages 437-449, March.
    20. Henderson, J. Vernon & Ono, Yukako, 2008. "Where do manufacturing firms locate their headquarters?," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(2), pages 431-450, March.
    21. Christian A. L. Hilber & Wouter Vermeulen, 2016. "The Impact of Supply Constraints on House Prices in England," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 126(591), pages 358-405, March.
    22. Gilles Duranton & Diego Puga, 2020. "The Economics of Urban Density," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 34(3), pages 3-26, Summer.
    23. David Albouy, 2016. "What Are Cities Worth? Land Rents, Local Productivity, and the Total Value of Amenities," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 98(3), pages 477-487, July.
    24. Maarten Goos & Alan Manning & Anna Salomons, 2014. "Explaining Job Polarization: Routine-Biased Technological Change and Offshoring," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(8), pages 2509-2526, August.
    25. Enrico Moretti, 2004. "Workers' Education, Spillovers, and Productivity: Evidence from Plant-Level Production Functions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(3), pages 656-690, June.
    26. Philip McCann, 2020. "Perceptions of regional inequality and the geography of discontent: insights from the UK," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 54(2), pages 256-267, February.
    27. Stephen Gibbons & Olmo Silva & Felix Weinhardt, 2013. "Everybody Needs Good Neighbours? Evidence from Students’ Outcomes in England," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 123, pages 831-874, September.
    28. Gundi Knies & Patricia C Melo & Min Zhang, 2021. "Neighbourhood deprivation, life satisfaction and earnings: Comparative analyses of neighbourhood effects at bespoke scales," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 58(13), pages 2640-2659, October.
    29. Nicolas Fleury & Fabrice Gilles, 2018. "The intergenerational transmission of education. A meta-regression analysis," Education Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 26(6), pages 557-573, November.
    30. Philip Oreopoulos, 2006. "Estimating Average and Local Average Treatment Effects of Education when Compulsory Schooling Laws Really Matter," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(1), pages 152-175, March.
    31. Daron Acemoglu, 2002. "Technical Change, Inequality, and the Labor Market," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 40(1), pages 7-72, March.
    32. Edward L. Glaeser & Matthew G. Resseger, 2010. "The Complementarity Between Cities And Skills," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(1), pages 221-244, February.
    33. Facundo Alvaredo & Anthony B. Atkinson & Thomas Piketty & Emmanuel Saez, 2013. "The Top 1 Percent in International and Historical Perspective," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 27(3), pages 3-20, Summer.
    34. Raj Chetty & Nathaniel Hendren & Lawrence F. Katz, 2016. "The Effects of Exposure to Better Neighborhoods on Children: New Evidence from the Moving to Opportunity Experiment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(4), pages 855-902, April.
    35. Stephen Gibbons & Henry G. Overman & Panu Pelkonen, 2014. "Area Disparities in Britain: Understanding the Contribution of People vs. Place Through Variance Decompositions," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 76(5), pages 745-763, October.
    36. Enrico Moretti, 2021. "The Effect of High-Tech Clusters on the Productivity of Top Inventors," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 111(10), pages 3328-3375, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Gilles Duranton & Diego Puga, 2020. "The Economics of Urban Density," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 34(3), pages 3-26, Summer.
    2. Bosquet, Clément & Overman, Henry G., 2019. "Why does birthplace matter so much?," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 26-34.
    3. Raoul van Maarseveen, 2021. "The urban–rural education gap: do cities indeed make us smarter? [Educational investment responses to economic opportunity: evidence from Indian road construction]," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 21(5), pages 683-714.
    4. Hanushek, Eric A. & Jacobs, Babs & Schwerdt, Guido & Van der Velden, Rolf & Vermeulen, Stan & Wiederhold, Simon, 2021. "The Intergenerational Transmission of Cognitive Skills: An Investigation of the Causal Impact of Families on Student Outcomes," IZA Discussion Papers 14854, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    5. Chapelle, Guillaume & Domènech Arumí, Gerard & Gobbi, Paula Eugenia, 2023. "Housing, Neighborhoods and Inequality," CEPR Discussion Papers 17969, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    6. Raoul van Maarseveen, 2020. "The urban rural-education gap: do cities indeed make us smarter?," CPB Discussion Paper 412, CPB Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis.
    7. Gharad Bryan & Edward Glaeser & Nick Tsivanidis, 2019. "Cities in the Developing World," NBER Working Papers 26390, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Francesco Andreoli & Eugenio Peluso, 2016. "So close yet so unequal: Reconsidering spatial inequality in U.S. cities," Working Papers 21/2016, University of Verona, Department of Economics.
    9. Alex Bell & Raj Chetty & Xavier Jaravel & Neviana Petkova & John Van Reenen, 2019. "Who Becomes an Inventor in America? The Importance of Exposure to Innovation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 134(2), pages 647-713.
    10. Carlino, Gerald & Kerr, William R., 2015. "Agglomeration and Innovation," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, in: Gilles Duranton & J. V. Henderson & William C. Strange (ed.), Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 0, pages 349-404, Elsevier.
    11. John Gathergood & Fabian Gunzinger & Benedict Guttman-Kenney & Edika Quispe-Torreblanca & Neil Stewart, 2020. "Levelling Down and the COVID-19 Lockdowns: Uneven Regional Recovery in UK Consumer Spending," Papers 2012.09336, arXiv.org, revised Dec 2020.
    12. Duranton, Gilles & Puga, Diego, 2014. "The Growth of Cities," Handbook of Economic Growth, in: Philippe Aghion & Steven Durlauf (ed.), Handbook of Economic Growth, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 5, pages 781-853, Elsevier.
    13. Luis Bauluz & Sebastien Breau & Pawel Bukowski & Mark Fransham & Annie Seong Lee & Neil Lee & Margarita Lopez Forero & Clement Malgouyres & Filip Novokmet & Moritz Schularick & Gregory Verdugo, 2023. "Spatial wage inequality in North America and Western Europe: changes between and within local labour markets 1975-2019," CEP Discussion Papers dp1941, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    14. Jordy Meekes & Wolter H. J. Hassink, 2023. "Endogenous local labour markets, regional aggregation and agglomeration economies," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 57(1), pages 13-25, January.
    15. McNeil, Andrew & Luca, Davide & Lee, Neil, 2023. "The long shadow of local decline: Birthplace economic adversity and long-term individual outcomes in the UK," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    16. Adrien Bilal & Esteban Rossi‐Hansberg, 2021. "Location as an Asset," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 89(5), pages 2459-2495, September.
    17. Peter Mayerhofer & Oliver Fritz, 2013. "Wiens Stadtwirtschaft. Internationale Spezialisierungschancen, zentrale Wirtschaftsbereiche," WIFO Studies, WIFO, number 57933, April.
    18. Aarland, Kristin & Santiago, Anna Maria & Galster, George C. & Nordvik, Viggo, 2021. "Childhood Housing Tenure and Young Adult Educational Outcomes: Evidence from Sibling Comparisons in Norway," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(C).
    19. Saiz, Albert, 2023. "The Global Housing Affordability Crisis: Policy Options and Strategies," IZA Policy Papers 203, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    20. Dai, Tianran & Schiff, Nathan, 2023. "The structure and growth of ethnic neighborhoods," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 137(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    spatial inequality; place; labour market;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • R14 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Land Use Patterns
    • J01 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - General - - - Labor Economics: General
    • J1 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:121453. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: LSERO Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/lsepsuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.