Agglomeration effects on labor productivity : an assessment with microdata

"Urbanization and localization effects are known to boost the regional economy and its growth potential. The emergence of these effects is due to localized knowledge flows, the closeness to markets, but also due to the diversity of services and industries. All these effects have the potential to increase the productivity (and profitability) of firms. Whereas many studies have been conducted at the industry or the regional level, this paper adds to the existing literature by starting at the level of establishments and taking the interaction with the surrounding regions into account. This is possible by exploiting an exceptionally large establishment panel study and the employment statistics for Germany. The empirical analyses are carried out in two steps regressions in order to separate the characteristics of establishments from regional influences.