A spatial econometric approach to EU regional disparities between economic and geographical periphery

A conditional ß-convergence model and a distance-based weight matrix are used to analyse the economic convergence among European NUTS-2 regions over the period 1980-2006. A Spatial Autoregressive Model which identifies two spatial regimes and spatial dependence finds that the convergence process among EU regions is affected by polarization into two clusters defined both on a geographical and economic criterion, which converge at different rates towards different steady states. This result confirms the hypothesis that a methodology which uses spatial econometric techniques is needed to model spatial effects, and that otherwise the estimates are likely to be inefficient or even biased.