The optimal size of an urban area is a controversial topic. We take optimal urban size to be that which minimizes net costs of city size, with larger cities first having various economies of scale (e.g. waste pickup) then later diseconomies of scale (e.g. pollution, congestion)

The city of Brussels has a unique position in Europe. It is not only the capital city of the European Union, it also the capital of federal state of Belgium, of its two different language communities and of the government of the Brussels region. Independent of this, the city itself is composed...

The issue I want to take up here is how networks influence firm business not only from the costs and R&D side, but also from the demand side because of substitution - complementarity effects. In other words firms face networks at every intermediate level that has to meet the market. I will...

Due to globalization competitive firms face increasing economic opportunities for locating their activities in countries, regions and cities that provide the best business environment for their specific needs. In our study we focus on the impact of economic risk and risk preferences upon...

This paper investigates the link between trade and environment by exploring the effects of green tariffs on the location of firms, innovation and the environment. It shows that tariffs levied on polluting goods could result in less global pollution than harmonization of environmental standards...

Our paper extends the capital tax competition literature by incorporating heterogeneous capital and agglomeration. Our model nests the standard tax competition model as well as the special case in which there is agglomeration but no firm/capital heterogeneity and the opposite case, firm...

This paper analyzes the effects of land use constraints on housing prices. We provide a new framework for evaluating policy when mobility across regions is allowed but limited. A key result is that loosening regulatory constraints within individual regions would have little effect on prices for...

In order to evaluate the allocational effectiveness of regional policy when harmonizing regional economic conditions firms? preferences play a pivot role. If harmonization hinders risk diversification of the firm, then instead of regional diversification of capital agglomeration of capital...

This paper considers a model of spatial allocation of investment capital under uncertainty. We demonstrate that the spatial concentration of economic activity depends upon properties of risk preferences deeper than risk aversion. The degree of so-called relative prudence unambiguously decides...

The purpose of the paper is to outline an analytical framework which captures the ample scope of locational competition: cost differences, resulting from differences in factor prices including taxes, human capital, infrastructure services and total factor productivity. If cost differences are...