Urban Economics (2225.YR.015282.1)

General information

Type:	OPT	Curs:	3	Period:	S semester
ECTS Credits:	3 ECTS

Teaching Staff:

Group	Teacher	Department	Language
Year 3	Nicolás Francisco González Pampillón	Economía, Finanzas y Contabilidad	ENG

Basic knowledge of microeconomics and econometrics

This course in urban economics will provide knowledge which will form the basis of original thinking in the development or application of ideas, overall and in a research context. It will improve the capacity of students to communicate conclusions, judgments and the grounds on which they have been reached to specialist and non-specialist audiences clearly and unambiguously. We help develop students' capacity to recognize, analyse and assess the complexity, functioning and main challenges of socioeconomic reality to contribute to the resolution of the economic problems it faces. Finally, it will improve students' ability to search and analyse data from real-world economics to understand it fully.

In this course, we will study the economics of cities and urban problems by understanding the effects of geographic location on the decisions of individuals and firms. We will understand how the location of people and firms affects their behaviour and the outcomes they obtain. We will learn about the important advantages of agglomeration, of concentration in space, and explain why workers are more productive in cities. We will also gain insights on the costs of living in cities. Finally, we aimed to learn about the effectiveness of different urban policies.

First, we will focus on answering general questions such as: Why do cities exist? How do firms decide where to locate? What causes economic activity to be unequally distributed across space? What causes economic activity to be unequally distributed across space? Why do people live in cities? What determines the growth and size of a city? Which policies can modify the shape of a city?

After understanding why we live in cities, we will focus on the economic problems that arise due to living in cities. We will analyze different urban economic problems such as crime, transportation and congestion, housing, affordability, gentrification, and segregation. We will also analyze the effectiveness of urban policies aimed to curve urban problems, with the aim of answering the following questions: Do urban and regional policies work? Are these policies desirable?

1. Introduction What is Urban Economics? What Is an Urban Area?

2. Market Forces in the Development of Cities Why Do Cities Exist? - Quantifying agglomeration economies Why Do People live in cities? - Wages and urban sorting - The motives for agglomeration The cost of cities

3. Urban growth, city sizes, and their aggregate implications

4. Land Rent and Urban Land-Use Patterns Introduction to Land Rent and Land Use The monocentric city model Suburbanization and Modern Cities Land-Use Controls and Zoning

5. Poverty and Housing Segregation and Poverty Urban growth and decline - Gentrification Housing Policies

6. Urban Transportation Congestion

7. Education and Crime

8. Local Government

Most of the course will be based on the following text books:

- O'Sullivan, Urban Economics, Sixth Edition, McGraw-Hill 2006.

- Gilles Duranton & J. V. Henderson & William C. Strange (ed.), 2015. "Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 5, number 5.

Additional readings:
- Newspaper articles (to be given in class or posted on the web)
- Working papers or published economic papers. They are (and will be) assigned to some lectures.

Group	Teacher	Department
Year 3	Nicolás Francisco González Pampillón	Economía, Finanzas y Contabilidad