In this thesis, I set up a standard New Economic Geography model and estimate it in the regional context of the European Union. The analysis underlines the clear core-periphery structure of Europe, but also identifies forces that hint at a catching-up of lesser developed peripheral regions....

Recent trade models with heterogeneous firms have changed the interpretation of gravity equations. Chaney (2008) shows that the effect of distance on the number of exporters and average exports depends on key parameters characterizing the elements of market structure. We use firm-level export...

This article examines the performances of French exporting firms. Using a highly detailed database, we confirm that exporting firms are much bigger, more productive and more profitable than domestic ones. This difference is particularly strong for firms exporting to non-eu markets, and for small...

<alinea/> Creative and talented theorist, Paul Krugman is the main architect of the new theories of international trade. He has shown that international trade can emerge without comparative advantages, in an imperfectly competitive environment. His models have provided convincing explanations to...

This paper studies the determinants of location choice by foreign investors in France using a sample of almost 4000 foreign investments over 10 years and 92 locations. Concerning agglomeration effects, we find very strong evidence of positive spillovers between firms, and identify detailed...

Investigations of the effect of quality differences on heterogeneous performance in exporting have been limited by lack of direct measures of quality. We examine exports of French wine, matching the exporting firms to producer ratings from two wine guides. We show that high quality producers...

We study the consequences of heterogeneity in factor intensity on firm performance. We present a standard Heckscher–Ohlin model augmented with factor intensity differences across firms within a country–industry pair. We show that for any two firms, each of whose capital intensity is, for...

Traditional trade models ignoring the dimension of product quality generally lead to excessively low trade price elasticities. In this paper, we show that higher estimated trade price elasticities, more in conformity with theory, can be obtained by controlling product quality in trade equations....

New Economic Geography models describe a cumulative process of spatial agglomeration: Firms tend to cluster in locations with good access to demand, and similarly, workers are drawn to regions where market potential is high because the price index is lower there. This paper provides an empirical...