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Climatic conditions, cultural diversity, and labor productivity

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  • Gundlach, Erich
  • Matus-Velasco, Ximena

Abstract

Countries with the highest labor productivity overwhelmingly lie in the world's temperate climatic zones far away from the equator. The question we address is whether climatic conditions as measured by distance from the equator remain correlated with labor productivity after other variables are taken into account. We find that climatic conditions do not have a significant impact on labor productivity once we control for factor accumulation and cultural diversity within countries. Our regression results suggest that cultural diversity as measured by the degree of ethnolinguistic fractionalization may severely limit economic development in presently poor countries.

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  • Gundlach, Erich & Matus-Velasco, Ximena, 2000. "Climatic conditions, cultural diversity, and labor productivity," Kiel Working Papers 1015, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:ifwkwp:1015
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Erich Gundlach, 2001. "Education and Economic Development: An Empirical Perspective," Journal of Economic Development, Chung-Ang Unviersity, Department of Economics, vol. 26(1), pages 37-60, June.
    2. Edgardo Sica, 2005. "Climatic differences and Economic Growth across Italian Provinces: First Empirical Evidence," Quaderni DSEMS 20-2005, Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche, Matematiche e Statistiche, Universita' di Foggia.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    climatic conditions; factor accumulation; ethnolinguistic diversity; productivity;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • O4 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity

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