The long shadow of local decline: birthplace economic conditions, political attitudes, and long-term individual economic outcomes in the UK

McNeil, Andrew ORCID: 0000-0003-0791-9143, Lee, Neil ORCID: 0000-0002-4138-7163 and Luca, Davide (2022) The long shadow of local decline: birthplace economic conditions, political attitudes, and long-term individual economic outcomes in the UK. International Inequalities Institute Working Papers (76). International Inequalities Institute, London School of Economics and Political Science, London, UK.

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Abstract

Does growing up in a high-unemployment area matter for individual economic and political outcomes? Despite a significant focus upon the links between place of residence, life outcomes and political attitudes of individuals, there is less evidence on how local economic conditions at birth shape individual wages and political attitudes over the longterm. This paper links the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS) micro data from English and Welsh respondents with historic localised information on unemployment. Our results, which control for composition effects, family background, and sorting of people across places, show that being born into a high-unemployment Local Authority has a significant, long-term impact on individual’s economic outcomes, decreasing earnings in adulthood. Even accounting for individual economic outcomes, being born into a local authority of high unemployment makes individuals more economically left-wing, with a greater belief in an obligation for the government to provide jobs, but also less culturally tolerant. These results contribute to the debate on the nature and rationales of placebased policy solutions.

Item Type:	Monograph (Working Paper)
Official URL:	https://www.lse.ac.uk/International-Inequalities/P...
Additional Information:	© 2022 The Authors
Divisions:	Government Geography & Environment
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HC Economic History and Conditions H Social Sciences > HT Communities. Classes. Races
JEL classification:	J - Labor and Demographic Economics > J3 - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs > J31 - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials by Skill, Training, Occupation, etc. J - Labor and Demographic Economics > J3 - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs > J38 - Public Policy J - Labor and Demographic Economics > J6 - Mobility, Unemployment, and Vacancies > J62 - Job, Occupational, and Intergenerational Mobility R - Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics > R1 - General Regional Economics > R11 - Regional Economic Activity: Growth, Development, and Changes R - Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics > R2 - Household Analysis > R23 - Regional Migration; Regional Labor Markets; Population
Date Deposited:	09 Feb 2022 08:15
Last Modified:	11 Dec 2024 19:39
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/113681

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