Plants’ Self-Selection, Agglomeration Economies and Regional Productivity in Chile

Posted: 22 Jun 2009

See all articles by Hisamitsu Saito

Hisamitsu Saito

Obihiro University of Agriculture & Veterinary Medicine

M. Gopinath

Oregon State University - Department of Applied Economics

Date Written: July 2009

Abstract

In this study, we assess the relative contribution of plants’ self-selection and agglomeration economies to a region's productivity level. We focus on manufacturing plants by region in the Chilean food industry, which is not only a major source of employment and exports but also spatially dispersed. Our estimation of plant-level productivity corrects for possible simultaneity between productivity and conventional inputs and plants’ self-selection to locate in specific markets. Moreover, we account for three sources of externalities: localization, urbanization and demand-driven scale economies in our estimation. Then, a censored regression model relates regional productivity-distribution measures to agglomeration economies. We find that high-productivity (exporting) plants locate in a region where other plants in food industry agglomerate, industrial structure is diversified and market size is large. Our results suggest that plants’ self-selection outweighs the contribution of agglomeration economies in increasing a region's productivity level.

Keywords: economic geography, exporters, plant and regional productivity distribution

JEL Classification: R12, R30, L11

Suggested Citation

Saito, Hisamitsu and Gopinath, M., Plants’ Self-Selection, Agglomeration Economies and Regional Productivity in Chile (July 2009). Journal of Economic Geography, Vol. 9, Issue 4, pp. 539-558, 2009, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1422432 or http://dx.doi.org/lbp010

Hisamitsu Saito (Contact Author)

Obihiro University of Agriculture & Veterinary Medicine ( email )

United States

M. Gopinath

Oregon State University - Department of Applied Economics ( email )

213 Ballard Extension Hall
Corvallis, OR 97331-4501
United States

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