In this paper, we examine the relationship between the stock of human capital and productivity in the Spanish regions (NUTS III), and assess whether the transmission channel involves external economies. The empirical evidence points to a positive relationship between the two variables, although it cannot be explained in terms of the impact of exogenous local human capital external economies, but rather in terms of other demand factors.

This article analyses the importance of labour market institutions and, in particular, collective wage bargaining in shaping regional wage differences in the Spanish labour market. Using microdata from the Spanish Structure of Earnings Survey, our results reveal that there are significant inter-regional wage differences for similarly skilled workers. These differences are present throughout the whole wage structure and can be explained by both competitive and non- competitive factors, such as an insufficient competition in product markets. In this context, industry-level collective bargaining plays a major role in accounting for regional wage differences, a role that in the Spanish case is enhanced due to its unusual regional dimension.

In this paper we test for the presence of localisation economies due to input- output linkages between vertically related firms located in the same region. To undertake this we estimate, by duality, a quadratic cost function using a sector by sector panel at the European regional level in the period 1985-1995. Vertical economies are derived from the concept of scope economies and associated to regional advantages of having in the proximity specialised providers of intermediate goods. Several specifications are tested and results indicate that the necessary conditions for the existence of economies of vertical disintegration are satisfied as well as the sufficient conditions for some sectors, showing that vertical diseconomies are stronger for the more geographically concentrated industries. These effects are not pervasive since there are also opportunities for efficiency gains from a more vertically integrated production for some sectors in several regions.

The well-known “Decentralization Theorem” (Oates, 1972) establishes the superiority of decentralized public provision over the centralized case, which is not so sensitive to the diversity of expenditure needs among territories. We test this hypothesis using a unique Spanish database that provides information on road and educational infrastructure investment and capital stocks by region both before and after the decentralization of such responsibilities. We find that investment in both categories is much more sensitive to regional output and to infrastructure users and costs when sub-central governments have the responsibility over such services.

This paper aims at studying the scope of agglomerations economies empirically. In particular, two issues are explored. First, the industrial scope of agglomeration economies is analysed, by comparing the effects arising from co-localization of same industry firms (localization economies) to the benefits derived from large and diversified economic environments (urbanization/Jacobs diversity effects). Second, the geographic scope of these external effects is studied. These issues are addressed by studying the effects of local industrial characteristics on the one number of births of new establishments in the subsequent period. A theoretical framework is used to interpret regression results in terms of scale effects (productivity shifters). Econometric estimations are carried out, separately, for seven industries for Catalonia, which is a Spanish region, using 1997-2000 data. Evidence of localization, urbanization and diversity effects has been found. Agglomeration economies seem to work at a very local level.

The paper presents a framework for measuring spillovers resulting from local expenditure policies. We identify and test for two different types of expenditure spillovers: (i) “benefit spillovers”, arising from the provision of local public goods, and (ii) “crowding spillovers”, arising from the crowding of facilities by residents in neighboring jurisdictions. Benefit spillovers are accounted for by assuming that the representative resident enjoys the consumption of a local public good in both his own community and in those surrounding it. Crowding spillovers are included by considering that a locality’s consumption level is influenced by the population living in the surrounding localities. We estimate a reaction function, with interactions between local governments occurring not only between expenditure levels, but also between neighbors’ populations and expenditures. The equation is estimated using data on more than 2,500 Spanish local governments for the year 1999. The results show that both types of spillovers are relevant.