{"id":1613,"date":"2014-10-14T13:36:43","date_gmt":"2014-10-14T20:36:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/?p=1613"},"modified":"2014-10-14T13:36:43","modified_gmt":"2014-10-14T20:36:43","slug":"culture-and-urban-growth-we-still-dont-know-much","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2014\/10\/culture-and-urban-growth-we-still-dont-know-much\/","title":{"rendered":"Culture and urban growth: we still don’t know much"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"a<\/a>A few years ago I came across a paper by Oliver Falck, Michael Fritsch and Stephan Heblich, ‘The Phantom of the Opera: Cultural Amenities, Human Capital, and Regional Economic Growth<\/a>‘ that used a rather unique data set to try to get around the knotty problem of finding whether cultural amenities generated urban economic development, or followed urban economic development:<\/p>\n

We analyze the extent to which endogenous cultural amenities affect the spatial equilibrium share of high-human-capital employees. To overcome endogeneity, we draw on a quasi-natural experiment in German history and exploit the exogenous spatial distribution of baroque opera houses built as a part of rulers’ competition for prestigious cultural amenities. Robustness tests confirm our strategy and strengthen the finding that proximity to a baroque opera house significantly affects the spatial equilibrium share of high-human-capital employees. Then, a cross-region growth regression shows that these employees induce local knowledge spillovers and shift a location to a higher growth path.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I think this is a really interesting approach, a natural experiment. But scientific progress comes from falsification, and today I received a new paper by Thomas K. Bauer, Philipp Breidenbach and Christoph M. Schmidt, ‘“Phantom of the Opera” or “Sex and the City”? Historical Amenities as Sources of Exogenous Variation<\/a>‘:<\/p>\n

Using the location of baroque opera houses as a natural experiment, Falck et al. (2011) claim to document a positive causal effect of the supply of cultural goods on today’s regional distribution of talents. This paper raises serious doubts on the validity of the identification strategy underlying these estimates, though. While we are able to replicate the original results, we proceed to show that the same empirical strategy also assigns positive causal effects to the location of historical brothels and breweries. These estimated effects are similar in size and significance to those of historical opera houses. We document that all these estimates reflect the importance of institutions for long-run economic growth, and that the effect of historical amenities on the contemporary local share of high skilled workers disappears upon controlling for regions’ historical importance.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The good news: there is so much to be learned, so many great dissertation topics out there waiting to be picked up!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A few years ago I came across a paper by Oliver Falck, Michael Fritsch and Stephan Heblich, ‘The Phantom of the Opera: Cultural Amenities, Human Capital, and Regional Economic Growth‘ that used a rather unique data set to try to get around the knotty problem of finding whether cultural amenities generated urban economic development, or […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1615,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1613","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-issues","8":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/beer-garden.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3dIW5-q1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1156,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2014\/03\/gays-the-creative-class-and-the-ecological-fallacy\/","url_meta":{"origin":1613,"position":0},"title":"Gays, the ‘Creative Class’, and the Ecological Fallacy","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"March 21, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Gay men tend to live in expensive cities with nice amenities, both cultural and climactic. Does that mean they are rich? At the Atlantic, Nathan McDermott reports: Who are America\u2019s gays? To hear it as Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia would have it, gays are a privileged set, living it\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"nice amenities you have here","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/San-Francisco-43.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/San-Francisco-43.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/San-Francisco-43.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/San-Francisco-43.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/San-Francisco-43.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/San-Francisco-43.jpg?resize=1400%2C800&ssl=1 4x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2356,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2018\/08\/back-to-school-a-cultural-planning-syllabus\/","url_meta":{"origin":1613,"position":1},"title":"Back to school – a cultural planning syllabus","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"August 16, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"So after a stretch in university administration, I am back full-time in the classroom this fall. One of my classes is in Cultural Planning and Community Development - i.e. \"place-based\" cultural policy - and though I've taught bits and pieces of the subject here and there, have never had the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"do we have to do *all* the readings?","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/back-to-class.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/back-to-class.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/back-to-class.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/back-to-class.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":932,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2013\/07\/do-cultural-districts-matter\/","url_meta":{"origin":1613,"position":2},"title":"Do cultural districts matter?","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"July 1, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"At the Art Newspaper, Adrian Ellis claims that they do: Few cities command the accolade \u201cgreat\u201d or even \u201cliveable\u201d without a significant cultural presence. Today, whether the question is \u201cWhere is the best place to bring up your family?\u201d, \u201cWhere do knowledge workers congregate?\u201d or \u201cWhat attracts inward investment?\u201d, \u201cCities\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"walkable?","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/Dallas_Arts_District_Opera_House_construction_Meyerson-300x225.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1380,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2014\/06\/summer-books-bruce-katz-and-jennifer-bradleys-the-metropolitan-revolution\/","url_meta":{"origin":1613,"position":3},"title":"Summer books: Bruce Katz and Jennifer Bradley’s ‘The Metropolitan Revolution’","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"June 28, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"A dozen years ago, mayors and their economic development staff made sure they had a copy of Richard Florida's The Rise of the Creative Class on their desks. 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The article, by Arthur Nelson\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"'Hey, they're doing Mahler's 4th tonight\"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/creative-class-at-work.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/creative-class-at-work.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/creative-class-at-work.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/creative-class-at-work.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/creative-class-at-work.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1613"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1613\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1616,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1613\/revisions\/1616"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1615"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1613"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1613"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}