Does broadband internet allow cities to ‘borrow size’? Evidence from the Swedish labour market
Abstract
Borrowed size refers to the idea that small cities nearby larger metropolitan centres are able to reap the advantages of large agglomerations, without the agglomeration costs. This study explores whether broadband internet helps such smaller cities to enjoy the labour market benefits of a larger city. Using Swedish micro-data from 2007-2015, together with unique data on broadband, we find suggestive evidence that broadband allows smaller cities to reap such benefits indeed. We find that borrowed size is primarily driven by the overall penetration of broadband in the place of residence, rather than by broadband availability at the residence.
Citation
de Vos , D , Lindgren , U , van Ham , M & Meijers , E 2020 , ' Does broadband internet allow cities to ‘borrow size’? Evidence from the Swedish labour market ' , Regional Studies , vol. Latest Articles . https://doi.org/10.1080/00343404.2019.1699238
Publication
Regional Studies
Status
Peer reviewed
ISSN
0034-3404Type
Journal article
Rights
Copyright © 2020 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Description
Funding: VIDI grant no. 452-14-004, provided by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO).Collections
Items in the St Andrews Research Repository are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.