Agglomeration Economies in Classical Music
(2015) In Papers in Regional Science 94(3). p.443-468- Abstract
- 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.... (More)
- 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. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/4146080
- author
- Borowiecki, Karol Jan LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2015
- type
- Contribution to specialist publication or newspaper
- publication status
- published
- subject
- categories
- Popular Science
- in
- Papers in Regional Science
- volume
- 94
- issue
- 3
- pages
- 443 - 468
- publisher
- Wiley-Blackwell
- external identifiers
-
- wos:000359872200001
- scopus:84938535784
- ISSN
- 1056-8190
- DOI
- 10.1111/pirs.12078
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- 67892eb2-13c1-4d22-858f-417aab3a3f30 (old id 4146080)
- date added to LUP
- 2016-04-01 10:50:19
- date last changed
- 2024-04-21 21:50:03
@misc{67892eb2-13c1-4d22-858f-417aab3a3f30,
abstract = {{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.}},
author = {{Borowiecki, Karol Jan}},
issn = {{1056-8190}},
language = {{eng}},
number = {{3}},
pages = {{443--468}},
publisher = {{Wiley-Blackwell}},
series = {{Papers in Regional Science}},
title = {{Agglomeration Economies in Classical Music}},
url = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/pirs.12078}},
doi = {{10.1111/pirs.12078}},
volume = {{94}},
year = {{2015}},
}