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The Impact of a State-Level, Place-Based Economic Development Program: A Difference-in-Differences Approach Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2024-03-20 Michael J. Hicks, Dagney Faulk
This analysis uses a difference-in-differences approach to examine the impact of the Regional Cities Initiative (RCI) on economic development outcomes in counties that participated in the program relative to those that did not participate. The RCI was a place-based economic development program that was implemented in Indiana beginning in 2015. Through a competitive process, this program provided funding
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Impact of Race, Ethnicity, and Gender on the SBA Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) Loan Amounts Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2023-05-04 Iryna Demko, Ana Claudia Sant’Anna
The Paycheck Protection Program helped to preserve employment relationships during the sudden shutdown of economic activity due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper analyzes whether small business ...
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Credit Availability for Minority Business Owners in an Evolving Credit Environment Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2023-04-24 Brett Barkley, Mark Schweitzer
Disparities in access to small business financing through loan denials and discouragement are estimated using Federal Reserve Small Business Credit Survey data from 2016 to 2020. Substantial differ...
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A Middle Model of Economic Development? Revisiting the Economic Geography of Middle-Wage Occupations in the United States Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2023-04-06 Ben Armstrong, Elisabeth B. Reynolds
High-wage regions have frequently been models for economic development policy. However, these places have also been more likely to experience a “hollowing out” of the middle of the labor market, wh...
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Day-Labor Worker Centers: Advancing New Models of Equity and Inclusion in the Informal Economy Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2023-03-28 Nik Theodore
Day-labor worker centers are labor market intermediaries that target their interventions to underregulated segments of residential construction and allied industries. As sites of rulemaking in the ...
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Understanding Divergence in the Performance of Central Business District Economies Among U.S. Metropolitan Regions, 1995–2019 Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2023-03-27 Taner Osman
Although references to an urban resurgence are pervasive, on average, the share of regional jobs found in central business district (CBD) areas has fallen since the 1990s. Yet, this fact masks grea...
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COVID-19-Induced Automation: An Exploratory Study of Critical Occupations Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2023-03-20 Chun Song, Lionel J. Beaulieu, Indraneel Kumar, Roberto Gallardo
The COVID-19 pandemic may have spurred automation, especially in critical occupations. This article explores the potential of each detailed Standard Occupational Classification System (SOC) occupat...
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Bank Types, Inclusivity, and Payroll Protection Program Lending During COVID-19 Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2023-03-20 Mark K. Cassell, Michael Schwan, Marc Schneiberg
How do differences in bank or lending institution type shape access to credit for small businesses in poor and/or minority communities in the United States? Banking systems are populated by lenders...
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The Impact of New Jersey's Urban Enterprise Zones on Local Employment: A Synthetic Control Approach Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2023-03-09 Adam Scavette
The designation of enterprise zones is a place-based policy that seeks to revitalize economically blighted areas. The literature on place-based policies has found mixed results regarding their effe...
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Collaboration and Public Participation for Municipal Growth in Land Economic Development Projects Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2023-02-27 Ki Eun Kang, Kyungha Lee
This study examines the impacts of collaboration and public participation on municipal growth in midsize U.S. municipalities. It specifically looks at the cases of land economic development project...
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The Racial and Spatial Impacts of the Paycheck Protection Program Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2023-02-27 T. William Lester, Matthew D. Wilson
The Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), with spending of nearly $800 billion, was the largest component in the United States’ economic response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The intention of the program...
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COVID-19, the New Urban Crisis, and Cities: How COVID-19 Compounds the Influence of Economic Segregation and Inequality on Metropolitan Economic Performance Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2023-02-19 Richard Florida, Todd Gabe
This paper examines the connection between measures of a U.S. metropolitan area's new urban crisis (i.e., unaffordable housing, economic inequality, and residential segregation) and its year-over-y...
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Understanding Economic Development Organization Efforts to Advance Inclusive Economic Recovery in Virginia Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2023-02-15 Margaret Cowell, Conaway Haskins, Shaheera Sayed
This research incorporates preliminary findings from a survey and case studies of economic development organizations (EDOs) in Virginia as these entities initiate their economic recovery planning p...
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Centering Work: Integration and Diffusion of Workforce Development Within the U.S. Manufacturing Extension Network Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2023-02-15 Nichola Lowe, Greg Schrock, Matthew D. Wilson, Rumana Rabbani, Allison Forbes
As the U.S. economy rebounds from the COVID-19 pandemic, strategies that promote long-term transformation toward quality jobs will be critical. This includes workplace-improving interventions that ...
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Banking Deserts and the Paycheck Protection Program Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2023-02-03 Kristopher Deming, Stephan Weiler
The Paycheck Protection Program was a highly unusual policy measure enacted to provide bridge capital to support small businesses coping with the dramatic downturn in demand due to the COVID-19 pan...
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What Is Economic Development? And What Is the Job of an Economic Development Professional? Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2023-01-02 Edward (Ned) Hill
Economic development (EcD) introduces new goods and services into a region's portfolio of traded products or expands the productive capabilities of existing members of a region's economic base. And...
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Growth in Commuting Patterns and Their Impacts on Rural Workforce and Economic Development Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-12-22 Matt Kures, Steven C. Deller
Residential and employment locational decisions for working households are frequently commingled. Numerous economic and social factors like job accessibility, wage differentials, housing markets, t...
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Measuring What Matters in Business Support Programs Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-12-19 Phillip A. Singerman, Kenneth P. Voytek
The U.S. federal government operates a myriad of programs aimed at assisting businesses, typically small and midsized firms, to improve their performance. This commentary focuses on nonfinancial bu...
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Prospects for Growth and Change: U.S. Metro Area Forecasts 2022–2032 Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-12-18 Frederick R. Treyz
Since February 2020, severe economic disruption, policy responses, and behavioral shifts have created an uncertain economic future at the global, national, state, and local levels. In the context o...
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Applied Regional Economic Research Can Improve Development Strategies and Drive Better Outcomes Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-12-13 Kenneth E. Poole, Allison Forbes, Nichelle Williams
The COVID-19 pandemic brought about an unimagined level of federal investment in regional economic development and much greater political attention to its priorities. Economic development researche...
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Suggestions for Future Research in the Area of Workforce Development Systems and Regional Economic Development in the United States Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-12-12 Kevin Hollenbeck
Workforce development systems operate as a linchpin between individuals who desire or need to develop skills that will be remunerated well and will lead to fulfilling careers in the labor market an...
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Arts and Cultural Innovation as Small City Economic Development Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-12-12 Ann Markusen
Arts and journalism enterprises may serve as effective economic development tools for small cities and neighborhoods. The author demonstrates how a new, for-profit, weekly newspaper serving a Minne...
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Challenges to Identifying Economic Development Impacts Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-12-12 Shawn Rohlin
Researchers investigating causal estimates of economic development programs face many challenges. This commentary highlights three challenges for future researchers to consider. Specifically, the a...
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What is Inclusionary Economic Development—What if Employees Mattered? Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-12-07 George A. Erickcek
While several inclusionary economic development policies may appear similar to traditional economic development policies, they are different in focusing on four key concerns. First, they are more f...
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Improving the U.S. Workforce System by Transforming its Performance Measurement System into an Intelligent Information System Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-12-05 Randall W. Eberts
A smart public workforce system requires customized tools to help customers navigate through the complexities of finding a job or finding qualified workers. It also requires that information flow i...
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Entrepreneurial Ecosystems and Economic Development Policy Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-12-05 Haifeng Qian, Zoltan J. Acs
The authors discuss economic development policy facing the burgeoning entrepreneurial ecosystem research. They aim to answer four questions. First, how are entrepreneurial ecosystems different from...
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Policy, Empirical Analysis, and Equity: Challenges for Research Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-12-04 Richard McGahey
Regional economic development research must engage with empirical questions and policy evaluations and America's underlying anti-urban bias, which shapes American cities and policy. Standard mathem...
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Fixing Work, and Moving Beyond It Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-11-27 Cathy Yang Liu, Marc Doussard, Nichola Lowe
This commentary reviews the challenges facing both U.S. workers and the central place of work in economic development. As the Great Resignation demonstrates, work is not working well for large port...
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Can we “Claim” the Workforce? A Labor-Focused Agenda for Economic Development in the Face of an Uncertain Future Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-11-25 Karen Chapple, Laura Schmahmann
The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated three trends that were already transforming economic development theory and practice. A backlash to economic restructuring and inequality, driven by globalization ...
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Seize the Time: Needed Research on Local Economic Development in an Era of Increased Attention to Problems of Place Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-11-16 Tim Bartik
Within the policy area of local economic development, this paper identifies five research needs: 1) better definitions of local labor markets; 2) policy know-how on how local economic development’s...
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How are Economic Development Districts Riding the Waves of Economic Development Strategies? Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-09-19 Li Fang
Previous studies have examined the local adoption of various development strategies primarily by surveying economic development practitioners, although the survey method suffers from subjectivity a...
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Place-Based Small Business Support and its Implications for Neighborhood Revitalization Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-09-09 Iuliia Shybalkina
Policy makers utilize various place-based interventions to reduce spatial inequality. In particular, there has been increasing attention to supporting small businesses in distressed places, but the...
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Innovation Districts and Community Building: An Effective Strategy for Community Economic Development? Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-08-24 Carla Maria Kayanan, Joshua Drucker, Henry Renski
Innovation districts are being advocated for their potential to create or revitalize communities, produce neighborhoods with housing near work, and benefit surrounding communities by creating jobs ...
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Introduction to the Special Issue on Rural Economic Development: New Research Insights and how the COVID-19 Pandemic may Impact Future Investment Strategies. Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-08-01 Martin Lavelle
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Can Tax Increment Financing Benefit U.S. Rust Belt Communities? Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-07-27 Komla D. Dzigbede, Rahul Pathak
Place-based economic policies and value-capture instruments are resurging in many American communities looking for alternative ways to fund infrastructure projects and support local economic reviva...
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The Value of Rural and Urban Public Infrastructure Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-07-18 David Albouy, Heejin Kim
The authors estimate the value of public infrastructure using a panel of rural and urban counties in the United States from 1970 to 2012. Regression estimates imply public infrastructure increases ...
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A Data-Driven Algorithm to Redefine the U.S. Rural Landscape: Affinity Propagation as a Mixed-Data/Mixed-Method Tool Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-06-03 Benjamin W. Heumann, Marcello Graziano, Maurizio Fiaschetti
This study demonstrates the application of affinity propagation as a data-driven approach to identifying and mapping typologies of place along the urban-rural continuum. The authors characterize Zi...
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Local Employment Impacts of Connectivity to Regional Economies: The Role of Industry Clusters in Bridging the Urban-Rural Divide Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-05-09 Christiana K. McFarland, Erica H. Grabowski
This article proposes a new economic development framework – regional economic connectivity – to address the deep and growing urban-rural divide. Regional economic connectivity calls attention to the benefits to local communities of fostering connectivity to industry clusters and economic specializations that are already present in their broader regions. This analysis examines the relationship between
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How Do Employers Belonging to Marginalized Communities Respond to Minimum Wage Increases? The Case of Immigrant-Owned Businesses in Seattle Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-04-11 Mahesh Somashekhar, James Buszkiewicz, Scott W. Allard, Jennifer Romich
Minimum wage opponents often argue that businesses owned by marginalized communities, which include woman-owned, Black-owned, and immigrant-owned businesses, are exceptionally vulnerable to minimum wage increases. Little research has investigated this claim. Using a unique survey of Seattle businesses that includes owners’ nativity status and was administered while the city began to phase in its $15
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Socioeconomic and Environmental Indicators for Rural Communities: Bridging the Scholarly and Practice Gap Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-03-14 Catherine Brinkley, Marjory Anne Visser
Because of large acreages, sparse populations, and distinct sociopolitical dynamics, many rural communities are beginning to assemble their own sets of economic indicators to fit unique policy agendas. This review summarizes over 30 years of practical efforts from six regions that created economic development reports. Reports cover 60% of the nonmetro counties in the United States. Over half the reports
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Is COVID-19 Causing More Business Closures in Poor and Minority Neighborhoods? Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-03-14 Yasuyuki (Yas) Motoyama
We are starting to understand the magnitude of economic damage from the COVID-19 pandemic. Current estimates cover the national or state level, but tell us little about how massive business closures may be affecting urban vitality at the intrametropolitan level. A particular concern is whether urban areas with high poor or minority populations are more deeply affected. This paper combines InfoGroup
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Local Economic Development Policies and Business Activity: Dynamic Panel Data Analysis of All County Governments in the State of Georgia Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-03-08 Mikhail Ivonchyk
Governments use economic development incentives to attract new investment and retain existing businesses. Empirical evidence for their effectiveness remains inconclusive. This research tests the effect of incentives on the number of firms, employees, and their payroll in a longitudinal study of all county governments in the state of Georgia over 16 years. It incorporates a comprehensive set of incentives
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Book Review: The Innovation Stack: Building an Unbeatable Business One Crazy Idea at a Time by J. McKelvey Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2022-02-18 Florence Neymotin
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Toward a New Rural Typology: Mapping Resources, Opportunities, and Challenges Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-12-30 Christelle Khalaf, Gilbert Michaud, G. Jason Jolley
While the concept of rurality has been debated in academic and professional literature for decades, less research has been done on a practical typology that can guide localized economic development strategies. This paper adds to the growing body of literature in search of a more nuanced definition of rural by applying unsupervised machine learning (ML) to the abundance of existing county-level data
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Can Targeted Government Investment in Rural Establishments Induce Innovative Activity? Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-12-23 John T. Mann, Steven R. Miller, Trey Malone
Rural economic development strategies increasingly focus on “homegrown” economic policies, including investing in entrepreneurial development. However, few studies have evaluated the effectiveness of these strategies, in part because of data constraints. Using a mixed-methods approach, basic t-tests, fixed-effect probit regression, and propensity scoring techniques on data from the Small Business Innovation
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What Moves Physicians to Work in Rural Areas? An In-Depth Examination of Physician Practice Location Decisions Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-12-14 Xiaochu Hu, Michael J. Dill, Sarah S. Conrad
This study contributes to the current understanding of what drives physicians to practice in rural areas by analyzing new, comprehensive survey data of practicing physicians in the United States. This research confirmed that rural origin is a powerful and reliable predictor for rural practice and revealed that new and experienced physicians have different priorities regarding location choice. Physicians
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Toward a More Complete and Nuanced Examination of Ohio and Pennsylvania’s 1980s Technology-Based Economic Development Strategies Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-12-14 Dan Berglund
Editor’s Note: The following Letter to the Editor, by Dan Bergland, is an opinion piece that offers Mr. Bergland’s perspective on an article published by Ben Armstrong in the August 2021 issue of Economic Development Quarterly (EDQ), titled “Industrial Policy and Local Economic Transformation: Evidence from the U.S. Rust Belt.” Mr. Berglund’s Letter to the Editor is accompanied by a response from Ben
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Response to Berglund Letter Regarding “Industrial Policy and Local Economic Transformation: Evidence from the Rust Belt” Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-12-03 Ben Armstrong
Dan Berglund’s Letter to the Editor offers a practitioner’s perspective on my research article comparing the role of industrial policies in Pittsburgh and Cleveland during the 1980s and afterward. Mr. Berglund worked for the State of Ohio’s Department of Development and later for Ohio’s Thomas Edison Program, one of the policies discussed in the article, during the 1990s. As Mr. Berglund suggests,
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Book Review: Will the gig economy prevail? by Colin Crouch Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-12-03 Jay D. Gatrell
The nature of work and employment has changed. From the perspective of economic development practitioners and individuals committed to advancing workforce development, the shift away from traditional employment toward precarious, or gig, labor has implications for capital investment, public policy, and local tax bases. Although this book and its laser-like focus on the terms of employment may not seem
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Do Smart Cities Technologies Contribute to Local Economic Development? Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-11-23 Sawsan Abutabenjeh, Julius A. Nukpezah, Annus Azhar
Governments around the world are exploring strategies that contribute to increased government performance and economic development that enable them to meet the service-tax expectations of their citizens. Within the framework of technology use in public management, this sudy examines the effects of smart cities technologies on the importance that chief administrative officers attach to local economic
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Bringing Health Care to Appalachia: The Long-Run Impact of a Rural Health Care System Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-11-23 Theodore F. Figinski, Erin Troland
The U.S. government has supported rural hospitals through direct subsidies and staff recruitment programs. However, little is known about the long-run impact of large-scale changes to rural health care. The authors explore the long-run trajectory of Appalachian counties where a coal mining union introduced a pioneering rural health care program in the 1950s, anchored by a chain of high-quality hospitals
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Empirical Evidence on the Economic Impacts of Hotel Taxes Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-10-30 Charles Swenson
Tourist taxes are an important source of revenue for many governments. In the United States, all states impose them in the form of hotel/motel occupancy taxes, yet there is little ex post evidence as to whether such taxes affect occupancy rates. This study uses a precise establishment-level data source to examine California's varying rates by city, enabling powerful tests. The author finds that such
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Linking People’s Mobility and Place Livability: Implications for Rural Communities Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-10-19 Xue Zhang
This study integrates life-course theory and mobility research to explore livability factors that attract migrants in different age groups between rural and urban counties in the United States. Place livability is measured by economy, housing market, natural amenity, neighborhood, civic and social engagement, and health. Migrants are grouped into young, middle-aged, and older adults. Results of Structural
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Proceedings From the Conference on the Impact of Housing Affordability on Economic Development and Regional Labor Markets Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-10-14 Sarah Miller, Katherine T. Kiernan
Housing affordability is an important component of economic development. It affects several levers for regional growth, including business formation, through wealth building and influencing entrepreneurship. Housing affordability also affects location decisions—of both labor and employers. These proceedings document findings from research presented at a conference titled “The Impact of Housing Affordability
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Do Restrictive Land Use Regulations Make Housing More Expensive Everywhere? Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-10-12 John Landis, Vincent J. Reina
This study makes three contributions to the debate over the effect of local land use regulations on housing prices and affordability. First, it is more geographically extensive than previous studies, encompassing 336 of the nation's 384 metropolitan areas. Second, it looks at multiple measures of regulatory stringency, not just one. Most prior studies have focused either on a single regulatory measure
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Boon or Burden? Evaluating the Competing Effects of House-Price Shocks on Regional Entrepreneurship Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-10-11 Nicholas Kacher, Luke Petach
This paper examines the impact of changes in housing affordability on regional entrepreneurship. Two-way fixed-effects estimates suggest an increase in the level of house prices in a commuting zone results in a decline in establishment openings as a share of existing establishments—consistent with a crowding-out effect. In contrast, an increase in the growth rate of house prices results in a small
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Book Review: The Mismeasure of Progress: Economic Growth and its Critics by S. Macekura Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-10-07 Gordon F. Mulligan
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An Introduction to the Special Issue Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-09-27 Stuart Andreason
Housing and economic opportunity are inextricably linked. The coronavirus-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and the public policy response have shown how deeply the connection between housing, opportunity, and economic security are tied. While these dynamics have been brought to the forefront by the pandemic, there has been a relatively less deep study of the links between housing policy and economic development
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Big Tech on the Block: Examining the Impact of Tech Campuses on Local Housing Markets in the San Francisco Bay Area Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-09-21 Karen Chapple, Jae Sik Jeon
The rapid growth of tech company headquarters such as Apple, Facebook, and Google could potentially put new pressure on the housing market in adjacent residential neighborhoods, in the form of housing price appreciation and real estate speculation. This article examines the relationship between the big tech corporate campuses and Silicon Valley/San Francisco housing markets using the Zillow (ZTRAX)
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The Impact of Main Street Revitalization on the Economic Vitality of Small-Town Business Districts Econ. Dev. Q. (IF 1.077) Pub Date : 2021-08-20 Andrew J. Van Leuven
The Main Street Program is a popular smaller-scale economic development strategy used to revitalize historic town centers across the rural United States. In this article, a difference-in-differences design using longitudinal business establishment data is implemented to estimate the program’s causal impact on job and establishment growth in downtown retail districts. Using a pooled sample of four Midwest