Central position in the network drives employment

Zachary P. Neal comes to this conclusion by examining the total non-farm employment and air travel patterns of business passengers among 128 US metropolitan areas. 10.08.10 Scholars from a range of disciplines have long recognized that a city’s economic fortunes are closely tied to its position in networks of interurban exchanges. Causality direction and hypotheses However, it remains unclear whether cities occupy a central position in the network because they are sites of significant economic activity (i.e. a flow generation hypothesis), or whether they experience greater economic growth because they occupy a central position in the network (i.e. a structural advantage hypothesis). Method This paper tests these complementary hypotheses by examining the total non-farm employment in, and air travel patterns of business passengers among, 128 US metropolitan areas from 1993 – 2008 using a series of lagged regression models. Results: centrality drives employment Results lend support to the structural advantage hypothesis, but not for the flow generation hypothesis: centrality drives employment, but not vice versa. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implications of these results for infrastructure-focused approaches to economic development. The paper is available through this link: Neal, Z.P. (29 June 2010) 'The Causal Relationship between Employment and Business Networks in US Cities', Michigan State University Related documents can be found in the following Airneth files: Airport cities Economic impact of airports