Regions, resources, and economic geography: Sources of US regional comparative advantage, 1880-1987

This paper estimates the Rybczynski equation matrix for the twenty two-digit U.S. manufacturing industries for various years between 1880 and 1987. As predicted by the standard general equilibrium theory of interregional trade, the regression estimates show that a consistent set of factor endowments explains a significant amount of the geographic distribution of manufacturing activities over time. Although these results do not rule out the importance of increasing returns, they do suggest certain limits on how increasing returns affect U.S. economic geography. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science BN. All rights reserved.