Agglomeration economies in classical music1. (1st November 2013)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Borowiecki, Karol J
• Is Part Of: Papers in regional science. Volume 94:Number 3(2015:Aug.)
• Page Start: 443
• Page End: 468
• Publication Date: 2013-11-01
• Subjects: Regional planning -- Periodicals; City planning -- Periodicals; Urbanization -- Periodicals; Economic geography -- Periodicals; 307.12
• DOI: 10.1111/pirs.12078
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1056-8190

Abstract

<abstract abstract-type="main"> <title>Abstract</title> <p>This study investigates agglomeration effects for classical music production in a wide range of cities for a global sample of composers born between 1750 and 1899. Theory suggests a trade‐off between agglomeration economies (peer effects) and diseconomies (peer crowding). I test this hypothesis using historical data on composers and employ a unique instrumental variable – a measure of birth centrality, calculated as the average distance between a composer's birthplace and the birthplace of his peers. I find a strong causal impact of peer group size on the number of important compositions written in a given year. Consistent with theory, the productivity gain eventually decreases and is characterized by an inverted U‐shaped relationship. These results are robust to a large series of tests, including checks for quality of peers, city characteristics, various measures of composers' productivity, and across different estimations in which also time‐varying birth centrality measures are used as instrumental variables.</p> </abstract>