Date of Award
6-26-2026
Date Published
August 2026
Degree Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Department
Economics
Advisor(s)
Alexander Rothenberg
Subject Categories
Economics | Social and Behavioral Sciences
Abstract
This dissertation contains two papers on urban economic geography in a developing country context. In the first, I identify and quantify local spillovers between firms of heterogeneous ownership type using a rich dataset of Indonesian manufacturing firms with granular location information. Within local clusters of manufacturing employment, I find an elasticity of domestic firm productivity with respect to the average quality of domestic neighbors of 0.025, and an elasticity of domestic firm productivity with respect to the average quality of foreign neighbors of 0.002. For foreign-owned firms, I find little evidence of productivity spillovers from neighbors of either ownership type. A simple policy simulation indicates that areas of lower manufacturing density gain the most on average from a new high-productivity neighbor. In the second chapter, we study how neighborhood density affects residential carbon emissions, using detailed data from Indonesia and the Philippines. To address simultaneity, we instrument density with soil characteristics, and to address sorting, we control for community averages of observed characteristics. Unlike cities in developed countries, we find that density is positively correlated with residential energy use. After controlling for sorting, we find a precise null relationship between density and residential carbon emissions. Our results suggest that policies to control urban sprawl may not be successful in reducing residential carbon emissions in developing country cities.
Access
Open Access
Recommended Citation
Lathrop, Taylor, "Essays on Urban Economic Geography in Developing Countries" (2026). Dissertations - ALL. 2368.
https://surface.syr.edu/etd/2368
