This article examines the technical efficiency of museums based upon data derived from a questionnaire survey of South West England. A stochastic frontier production function is estimated with output measured in terms of visitor numbers. The Cobb-Douglas function is shown to be the best...

This paper analyses the role of human capital in determining regional variations in firm births. It is argued that both the level and heterogeneity of human capital are particularly important for services. This is confirmed by an empirical analysis of data for sub-regions of Great Britain from...

Identifying and measuring low carbon activities at the local authority level faces a number of problems related to the proliferation of overlapping low carbon concepts, a lack of data related to meaningful low carbon sectors and the rapidly changing nature of the sector. This paper provides a...

This study applies a distribution dynamics approach to examining the evolution of average earnings of UK counties. An analysis of both transition probability matrices and stochastic kernels suggests considerable persistence in the overall distribution rather than economic convergence. However,...

Cameron and Muellbauer (Economic Journal, 110, pp. 412-19, 2000) have convincingly argued that problems in the methods used to compile UK Regional Accounts data have resulted in a misleading picture of regional differentials and σ convergence. This short paper extends their analysis to a wider...

Gripaios P. and Bishop P. (2005) Government output and expenditure in UK regions and sub-regions: an analysis of the new experimental accounts data, Regional Studies 39 , 805-813. This paper examines the regional and sub-regional distribution of UK state spending by analysing new data available...

Gripaios P. and Bishop P. (2006) Objective One funding in the UK: a critical assessment, Regional Studies 40, 937-951. The paper examines several issues that question the underlying basis of UK Objective One funding. First, it is doubtful that the current qualifying regions are appropriate...

This paper examines patterns of persistence, mobility, convergence and divergence in the shape and evolution of the distribution of GDP per head across Great Britain (GB). Using a distribution dynamics approach, the evidence suggests that there is no pattern of overall convergence and a number...

This paper examines the impact of Objective 1 funding in Europe in reducing country and regional disparities in gross value added per capita by presenting a critical review of both empirical studies and end-of-term programme reports. In practice, it is very difficult to establish impact effects...

Personal insolvency rates vary considerably across local areas of England and Wales but the reasons for this have barely been explored. This paper presents an empirical study of the factors determining variations in personal insolvency rates in 2006 utilising newly available data. The results...