Unravelling the Global City Debate on Social Inequality: A Firm-level Analysis of Wage Inequality in Amsterdam and Rotterdam

In this article, an assessment is made of the consequences of globalisation for urban wage inequality. Using data on employers in the Dutch cities of Amsterdam and Rotterdam, it is shown that simply equating global city formation with globalisation, when it comes to urban wage inequality—which is the common research practice in urban studies—leads to a blind spot for the impact of international competition, falsely equates economic restructuring with globalisation and strongly overrates the impact of globalisation on the urban wage structure. Global city formation does not lead to polarising tendencies, while exposure to international competition leads to upgrading tendencies.