Regional Amenities Research Articles

Stay, leave late, leave early, return, or move onward? Interprovincial migration decisions of older adults in China, 2000–2005 and 2010–2015

AbstractExisting studies on the migration of older adults in China have tended to treat older migration as a one‐off activity and have failed to investigate the multiple processes involved. Based on the microdata samples of the 1% national population sample surveys in 2005 and 2015, this study examines the effect of regional and personal attributes on older adults' two‐phase migration decisions. In the first phase, older adults decide whether to leave the province of household registration, while in the second phase, they decide to stay in the same province, return to the province of household registration, or move onward to a new province. In the first phase of migration, older adults' decisions were affected by several regional amenities, including medical services, public green areas, air pollution, and temperature differences. In the second phase of migration, older adults who had decided to remain in the first phase tended to leave provinces with a lower cost of living, fewer public green areas, and more extreme temperature differences. Older adults who, in the first phase, had moved to a new province with fewer medical services, more severe air pollution, and larger temperature differences were more likely to return to their province of household registration in the second phase in 2000‐2005, while those residing in provinces with more extreme temperature differences tended to move onward to a new province in 2010‐2015. This study enhances our understanding of the heterogeneity of older migration in China by disentangling the complexity of multiple migration processes.

Bottom-Up Convergence? Explaining Uneven Income Growth in the New South

abstract: The southeastern United States has experienced rapid economic and population growth relative to the stagnation and decline of established manufacturing regions. The Rust Belt-Sun Belt literature has relied on a range of factors to explain southern growth (e.g., low wages, regional amenities, technological advances, market proximity, and the Civil Rights Movement). More recent work has cast growth in terms of bottom-up convergence and providing a conceptual framework consistent with the region's experience as the recipient of northern capital seeking a low-cost region. Within the region, uneven development remains. While the neoclassical framework can explain regional capital inflows, questions remain regarding how local and spatial contexts influence the trajectories of individual southern economies. To address these issues, this paper utilizes a conditional convergence model to explain southeastern county-level growth from 1990 to 2018 to understand how the balance of neoclassical processes and localized factors have affected the region's growth. Results highlight a transition away from low-cost manufacturing toward an increased importance of new, knowledge economy sectors. While new economy sectors are identified as significant drivers, results also suggest future challenges for sustained growth due to a suburbanized growth pattern, weak spillover effects, and a lack of urbanization economies.

Modelling heterogeneous preferences for nature‐based tourism trips

AbstractThis paper studies individual preferences for place‐based attributes in the context of nature‐based domestic tourism trips. We examine the regional characteristics that explain tourist destination choice focusing on taste heterogeneity for distance and temperature. We examine the influence of a set of mean shifters in the marginal utilities for regional amenities, and how individuals are willing to trade distance in exchange for warmer (cooler) climates (i.e., marginal rates of substitution). Using a rich dataset of trips within Spain for nature‐based purposes, we find large heterogeneity in preferences for temperature differentials and distance, with trip purposes acting as moderators.

Transit development and housing displacement: The case of the Chicago Red Line Extension

Chicago's South Side has long been characterized as a “transit desert” – an area with high transit inaccessibility and insufficient infrastructure to meet residents' needs (Jiao & Dillivan, 2013). Without adequate transit, residents cannot reach employment opportunities or regional amenities – contributing to economic, spatial, and social marginalization. The Chicago Transit Authority's proposed Red Line Extension (RLE) is designed to connect the city's far south side neighborhoods to Chicago's core. Given the scope of the RLE, 175 parcels have been chosen for demolition, meaning that a similar number of households face displacement to make room for the RLE right of way – which may have potentially negative consequences in realizing the subsequent benefits of improved transit access. In this article, we perform an ex-ante analysis of RLE induced displacement. Specifically, we: 1) predict potential location choices that transit displacees are most likely to choose; and 2) analyze these locations in relation to access to transit, amenities, employment, and housing affordability, among others. Within the context of transportation planning, ex-ante analysis is important because it can minimize unintended and negative consequences of transit-induced displacement – like decreased transit access and a loss of potential neighborhood improvements - by predicting potential relocation choices for displacees. Such predicted choices can help planners and decision-makers better understand the trade-offs for directly affected households and thereby allow planners and decision-makers to assist in relocation assistance that maximizes the benefits of the necessarily displaced.

Flocking to the crowd: Cultural entrepreneur mobility guided by homophily, market size, or amenities?

Economic activity and innovation clusters in urban areas. Urban economics points to important knowledge and productivity spillovers in cities, in addition to other factors like thicker markets, lower transportation costs, and consumptive amenities. Yet thus far little work has analyzed how these different factors drive migration decisions of arts-related entrepreneurs, especially when they work in online platforms for fundraising. We use data on the largest US crowdfunding platform to identify relocating creators, allowing us to identify which kinds of regions are attracting and retaining more of this sort of talent. We test for the influence of clustering based on homophily, migration to larger markets, and relocation toward particular geographic amenities. Overall we find the strongest evidence for homophily and some distinct tendencies favoring certain regional amenities. Importantly, we both identify general relocation patterns among crowdfunding creatives and break down the attracting features for different types of creators. An examination of (net) migration by different categories of projects, such as musicians or filmmakers, reveals important heterogeneity in the attractors. For example, musicians are drawn stronger music sectors, while writers seek more isolation from other writers. This helps inform the interregional competition for talent and “creative class,” especially among a group of relatively footloose arts- and culture-intensive entrepreneurs.

Amenity Migration and Public Lands: Rise of the Protected Areas.

Rural amenity migration, or the relocation for quality of life purposes as opposed to monetary enhancement, has been occurring for decades and has been particularly pronounced in the American West where the phenomenon peaked in the 1990s. Researchers have illustrated that some places are more attractive for migrants than others and that certain regional amenities hold considerable influence on where migrants relocate. Increased migration levels typically result in increased economic growth indicators, making amenity migration an attractive rural development strategy. But comprehensive econometric analysis focused on amenity migration in the American West has been lacking. To address this, we conducted an econometric analysis of attributes that influenced migration to rural Western counties from 1980 to 2010. Over 20 potential amenity supply categories were collated for 356 rural counties from 11 Western states, with a focus on public lands. Descriptive statistics and OLS regressions were estimated and interpreted. Traditional amenities of climate, water area, and regional access were highly associated with migration levels, while designated natural amenities of Wilderness and National Monuments were the most influential public lands for migration to rural Western counties. Farming and oil and gas dependency were negatively associated with migration levels. Increasing the amount of protected areas, and branding campaigns based on natural amenities, can be a critical development strategy for rural communities.

Growth, environmental change and business cycles in a multi-regional economy

The purpose of this is to examine multi-regional dynamics with wealth and pollutant accumulation over time. The paper generalizes the dynamic model by Zhang (2016). It treats regional amenities endogenous variables dependent on the region's population and level of pollutants. Regional differences in productivities and amenities are important for modelling regional agglomeration. The government decides environmental tax rates on production, consumption, wealth, income from wealth and housing. The economy is perfectly competitive. The dynamics of J-region economy is described by differential equations. We demonstrate business cycles due to different exogenous periodic perturbations in the multi-regional economy.

Maapiirkondade elavdamine: ehituspärand ja turundustegevus Lõuna-Eesti näitel / Revitalising rural areas: built heritage and promotion activities in South Estonian municipalities

The focus of this study is on marketing strategies used for promoting five different rural municipalities. It is the first study of its kind to describe the results and success of the process of revitalising rural areas over the past twenty years.Given the scope of the subject and the range of different approaches and strategies, the study does not aspire to present the final truth; it should, however, provide a basis for further discussions and, hopefully, opportunities for both the communities and local governments to plan relevant activities better and to evaluate the success of past attempts.
 The attraction held by rural areas has often been described as the ’rural idyll’, and is expressed in three components: landscapes, buildings, and communities / networks. Communal processes are characterised by long histories which render current impact obscure. The authors of this article found that evaluating them really requires a greater temporal distance and an approach with a tighter regional focus. So, our study can only lay the foundations by establishing the regional characteristics in a few cases of new rural settlement in South Estonia.
 The marketing elements employed in different regions tend to overlap to an extent, but it is also possible to identify variations in regional marketing. In general, it can be said that Halliste has been characterised by the simple sale of buildings relying on an existing network, while local culture dominates as the foundation for regional amenities in Värska and Peipsiääre communes, an employment-based strategy is used in Misso, and Antsla stands out as an unexplored region with a large potential.
 The marketing of rural areas can create a positive image for the municipality in question, provided that the activities are well-planned and skilfully executed. While population growth tends to be sporadic, it is important to note that in all the municipalities studied here, population decrease has virtually ceased in recent years. The general appearance of the landscape has also been improved, buildings as well as the village streets and general public space are now in better order. The community is strengthened as a result of this process.
 The success of subsequent activities should be supported, in the view of their proponents, by the fact that there have been no significant setbacks in at least four of the studied communities. The process could, however, be limited in future by the lack of suitable free buildings or by a steep rise in real estate prices.
 Interview questions were prepared with the aim of covering different areas and social groups. Given that the study was qualitative in nature, differences between the municipalities can be identified in general terms. Thus, the new inhabitants of Misso municipality tend to be blue collar workers, mostly working locally, thus alleviating the local labour shortage. In other four municipalities, the cultural and educational background of the newcomers tends to be somewhat different: these places mostly attract better-educated and better-off settlers. Most of them seem to be people seeking a summer home.
 Based on the analysis of the accumulated data, the authors of this study find that the marketing of rural areas should continue to rely on active local volunteers with an interest in the issue who are provided both financial aid and specialist expertise by local municipalities. Regional agendas should also be more clearly articulated and prepared in cooperation between all stakeholders. This would enable avoiding potential conflicts, and help achieve the best results, while toning down unrealistic expectations.
 We are aware that this is the first study seeking to evaluate rural marketing activities and strategies in Estonia. As a result, a number of sub-themes remain largely not discussed here, such as conflicts and the forces driving them. It is also necessary to examine and evaluate the involvement of old and new real-estate holders in the activities of the local community, decision-making processes, and public participation. We also need to develop a more accurate tool to help local governments with the marketing of their area and kick-starting destination-marketing by enabling them to measure the number of new arrivals, occupied real estate and, in the longer run, the effect on local economy.
 Keywords: rural amenities, architecture, landscapes, cultural values, communities, municipalities

Achieving a fair geographical distribution of health-care resources

This paper analyzes the factors determining the physicians’ location decisions when physicians have heterogeneous preferences about the regional amenities in a two-regions health care system. While the first best allocation entails geographic equality in access to and quality of health-care services, we show that free location decisions results in an unfair allocation in health care resources. We first characterize the public policies allowing to decentralize the first best. Then, we show that the optimal policy aiming at equalizing medical densities consists in setting regionally differentiated prices and a single lump-sum transfer. This transfer is a tax (resp. a subsidy) when the value of the difference in regional amenities is low (resp. high).

Climate Preferences, Obesity, and Unobserved Heterogeneity in Cities

Some sources of heterogeneity among cities, i.e. age, gender, race, income, and education, have been the object of substantial inquiry. The reasons are obvious. These differences are easily observed and may have important implications for economic activity. This study considers another potentially important population characteristic, obesity. Descriptive statistics reveal that the intercity variance in obesity rates is substantial. Empirical results demonstrate that demographic and regional amenity variables all help to explain intercity differences in obesity. Because obesity is important for climate preferences, health, and productivity, its omission from previous studies and its correlation with amenity and demographic characteristics could create problems for empirical research.

Business Cycles with Periodic Shocks in A Multi-Country and Multi-Regional Neoclassical Growth Model

This paper generalizes the global economic growth model with any number of countries and each country with any number of regions recently proposed by Zhang (2016). Zhang’s model extends Uzawa’s two-sector growth model to a global economy for examining dynamic interactions between international trade, national and global growth, interregional migration, wealth accumulation and regional amenities. This study generalizes Zhang’s model by allowing all the time-independent parameters to be time-dependent. The generalization makes it possible to examine effects of any types of exogenous time-dependent shocks on the dynamic system cross regions and countries over time. We simulate the model with three countries and each country with two regions. We demonstrate the existence of equilibrium point and confirm (local) stability of the equilibrium point when all the parameters are time-independent. We conduct comparative dynamic analysis with regard to exogenous periodic shocks in the total factor productivity of regions’ capital good sectors, the total factor productivities of the service sectors, the propensity to save, the amenity parameters, and the propensity to consume housing. Our comparative analysis shows how business cycles are generated by periodic exogenous shocks.

When growth collides: conflict between urban and airport growth in Melbourne, Australia

ABSTRACTInternational airports make significant contributions to state economies but can detract from local and regional amenity. Australian studies have examined the growth and management of major Australian airports particularly the gateway city of Sydney, and land-use issues associated with airport commercial developments. However, the impacts on future airport operations of incremental urban encroachment onto green belts around airports have been largely ignored. Development around some Australian airports is adding new housing estates to land close to airports. Such development threatens the curfew-free status of Melbourne Airport, the nation’s second largest airport, particularly when coupled with the construction of a planned third runway. This paper examines the failures of Commonwealth, State and local policy and planning systems to prevent extensive urban encroachment over the past 50 years in the green belt surrounding Melbourne Airport and the reciprocal impacts from this development. The threat to airport operations from residential development can only worsen as the projected contribution of Melbourne Airport to the state economy and passenger numbers set to double between 2025 and 2033. The paper examines key planning decisions, relates these to policy and institutional failures, and points to the need for integrated sectoral planning to minimise further impacts and threats.

Climate Preferences, Obesity, and Unobserved Heterogeneity in Cities

Some sources of heterogeneity among cities, i.e. age, gender, race, income, and education, have been the object of substantial inquiry. The reasons are obvious. These differences are easily observed and may have important implications for economic activity. This study considers another potentially important population characteristic, obesity. Descriptive statistics reveal that the intercity variance in obesity rates is substantial. Empirical results demonstrate that demographic and regional amenity variables all have a relation to intercity differences in obesity. Because obesity is important for climate preferences, performance, and productivity, its omission from previous studies and its correlation with amenity and demographic characteristics, could create problems for empirical research. For example, it is possible to explain the recent climate preference finding by Sinha and Cropper (2015) that willingness to pay for higher summer temperature is negatively correlated, ρ = − 0.83, with preferences for higher winter temperatures.

Effects of Regional Creative Milieu on Interregional Migration of the Highly Educated in Korea: Evidence from Hierarchical Cross-Classified Linear Modeling

This study empirically investigates the effects of a regional creative milieu on the migration inflows and outflows of the highly educated between urbanized areas in Korea. To estimate the push and pull effects, we use the 5% Population and Housing Census (2005) and employ a hierarchical cross-classified linear model as an empirical modeling framework. The graduate migration between areas is generally affected by regional and individual characteristics. To this effect, the literature suggests that highly-educated individuals tend to significantly value diverse and creative regional amenities in migration decision making. Our results reveal that, regarding the push and pull effect for the highly educated, talent and tolerance in a region and a high level of the creativity index in a region are likely to increase the likelihood of in-migration and decrease that of out-migration by lowering the barriers to entry for the highly educated. Our findings emphasize the role of regions with well-established amenities as a creative milieu for attracting the highly educated and, thus, have significant implications for sustainable regional development policies.

Japanese Regional Amenity Evaluation Considering Spatial Effects with Simultaneous Spatial Autoregressive Models

Empirical analyses on urban/regional amenity began in the 1980s. These economic researches measured the “quality of life index” (QOLI) of cities and regions. The endogenous variables, rent, wage and population, were explained by social and economical attributes as well as some amenity attributes of regions. Simultaneous equation models were estimated and regional levels of amenity were evaluated from the estimated coefficients.In the literature regarding amenity evaluation, interregional spatial interactions and interregional spatial effects have not been sufficiently considered, however. With progress of the motorization, and expansion of the high-speed public transportation network, interregional commuting and consumer activity between areas became common. Existing researches on the measurement of regional amenities are insufficient from this viewpoint. We will be able to evaluate the regional quality of life more precisely if we employ a model in which spatial influences between regions are considered. One of the techniques for modeling such influences is spatial autoregressive models. The technology has been well established in recent decades.There has been some research regarding amenity evaluation which considers interregional spatial influences using a simplified single equation model. We cannot ignore interdependencies between endogenous variables, however. We think that a simultaneous equation system should be adopted.In this paper, we formulate econometric analyses using simultaneous spatial autoregressive models. We combine simultaneous equation systems for the endogenous variables, and consider spatial influences using a spatial autoregressive model. In this research, we use data regarding cities and regions in Japan. The amenity variables, which we evaluate, concern living, education, safety, industrial accumulation, air pollution, and natural conditions.

Location Choices of the Creative Class: Does Tolerance Make a Difference?

ABSTRACT:Human capital and members of the creative class are bearers of economic growth, yet little is known about exactly what the relevant factors are for the concentration of the highly skilled in a specific place. Tolerance for example is supposed to make the difference between creative and human capital. But does tolerance really make a difference for anybody? And what about other factors: Are they specifically relevant for creative individuals or simply valid for the whole population? This study contributes to the discussion on the highly skilled by investigating whether tolerance, taxes, or other regional amenities contribute to their concentration and dynamics. The results show that tolerance in particular toward immigrants, but also toward same-sex partnerships, is a rather dynamic concept, differs largely between and within functional urban regions, and makes a difference regarding the highly skilled.

Understanding Urban Diversity: Obesity as Unobserved Heterogeneity

Some sources of heterogeneity among cities, i.e. age, gender, race, income, and education, have been the object of substantial inquiry. The reasons are obvious. These differences are easily observed and may have important implications for economic activity. This study considers another potentially important population characteristic, obesity. Descriptive statistics reveal that the intercity variance in obesity rates is substantial. Empirical results demonstrate that demographic and regional amenity variables all have a relation to intercity differences in obesity. Because obesity is important for preferences, performance, and productivity, its omission from previous studies and its correlation with amenity and demographic characteristics, could create problems for empirical research.

Estimating Benefits from Regional Amenities: Internal Migration and Life Satisfaction

This paper is the first to link economic theory with empirical life-satisfaction analyses referring to internal migration. We derive an extension of the Roback (1982) model to account for benefits from regional amenities in the utility function, while controlling for income, housing costs, and migration costs. Using highly disaggregated spatial panel information on people’s migration decisions and their life satisfaction for Germany, we provide an empirical investigation of the theoretical model by applying an individual fixed-effects model to rule out selection bias, while accounting for endogeneity of income. We find that short-term benefits from regional amenities represent about 21 percent of household income. These findings are robust to a number of alternative specifications.

WAGES, RENTS, UNEMPLOYMENT, AND THE QUALITY OF LIFE: A CONSISTENT THEORY‐BASED MEASURE

ABSTRACTCombining a spatial equilibrium model with a search‐matching unemployment model, this paper analyzes the willingness to pay for regional amenities and the regional quality of life when wages, rents, and unemployment risk compensate for local amenities and disamenities. The results are compared with those obtained from the Rosen‐Roback approach. We demonstrate that the traditional approach gives too much weight to the wage differential if search frictions are significant. Furthermore, the paper confirms that the wage curve is negatively sloped for quasi‐linear utility. Specifically, the wage rate increases and the unemployment rate decreases in response to an increase in the amenity level if the amenity is marginally more beneficial to producers than to consumers.

Growth and Land Use with Agriculture and Industry

This paper develops an economic growth model with economic structure and geography. The economy consists of one agricultural and one industrial sector and economic geography consists of urban and rural areas. The model synthesizes the main ideas in the Solow growth, the Alonso urban, and the von-Thünen's agricultural models in a compact framework. We simulate the model. We demonstrate that the economic geography has a unique equilibrium point with the specified parameter values. We examine changes in the preference, productivity, urban and regional amenities, transportation conditions, the population, and land endowment upon the long-term economic growth, structure, and geography.