Search Results
Journal Article
Urban legends
For centuries, economists have struggled to explain why people and businesses gather in cities.
Journal Article
Can cities control their destiny?
Working Paper
Subprime mortgages, foreclosures, and urban neighborhoods
This paper analyzes the impact of the subprime mortgage crisis on urban neighborhoods in Massachusetts. We explore the topic using a data set that matches race and income information from Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data with property-level, transaction data from Massachusetts Registry of Deeds offices. With these data, we show that much of the subprime lending in the state was concentrated in urban neighborhoods and that minority homeownerships created with subprime mortgages have proved exceptionally unstable in the face of rapid price declines. The evidence in Massachusetts suggests that ...
Journal Article
Housing decay: cause or symptom of urban decline?
Working Paper
Estimating a dynamic equilibrium model of firm location choices in an urban economy
We develop a new dynamic general equilibrium model to explain firm entry, exit, and relocation decisions in an urban economy with multiple locations and agglomeration externalities. We characterize the stationary distribution of firms that arises in equilibrium. We estimate the parameters of the model using a method of moments estimator. Using unique panel data collected by Dun and Bradstreet, we find that our model fits the moments used in estimation as well as a set of moments that we use for model validation. Agglomeration externalities increase the productivity of firms by about 8 ...
Journal Article
The geography of entrepreneurship in the New York metropolitan area
This article was presented at a conference organized by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in April 2005, "Urban Dynamics in New York City." The goal of the conference was threefold: to examine the historical transformations of the engine-of-growth industries in New York and distill the main determinants of the city's historical dominance as well as the challenges to its continued success; to study the nature and evolution of immigration flows into New York; and to analyze recent trends in a range of socioeconomic outcomes, both for the general population and recent immigrants more ...
Journal Article
Urban dynamics in New York City: conference overview and summary of papers
These articles were presented at a conference organized by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in April 2005, "Urban Dynamics in New York City." The goal of the conference was threefold: to examine the historical transformations of the engine-of-growth industries in New York and distill the main determinants of the city's historical dominance as well as the challenges to its continued success; to study the nature and evolution of immigration flows into New York; and to analyze recent trends in a range of socioeconomic outcomes, both for the general population and recent immigrants more ...
Journal Article
Redefining Main Street
Journal Article
Conference explores inner-city business development
The May 1 conferences titled "The untapped urban market: attracting business to the inner city," and presented by the Buffalo Branch of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in partnership with the University at Buffalo Department of Planning, discussed the economic challenges faced by inner-city communities and explored effective strategies for business development. We summarize the various inner-city development models presented at the conference and the discussion that arose around them.