TY  - JOUR
AU  - Kahn,Matthew E.
AU  - Mansur,Erin T.
TI  - How Do Energy Prices, and Labor and Environmental Regulations Affect Local Manufacturing Employment Dynamics? A Regression Discontinuity Approach
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 16538
PY  - 2010
Y2  - November 2010
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w16538
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w16538.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Matthew E. Kahn
UCLA Institute of the Environment
Department of Economics
Department of Public Policy
Anderson School of Management
UCLA Law School, Box 951496
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1496
Tel: 310/794-4904
Fax: 310/825-9663
E-Mail: mkahn@ioe.ucla.edu

Erin T. Mansur
Dartmouth College
6106 Rockefeller Hall
Hanover, NH 03755
Tel: (603) 646-2531
Fax: (603) 646-2122
E-Mail: erin.mansur@dartmouth.edu
AB  - Manufacturing industries differ with respect to their energy intensity, labor-to-capital ratio and their pollution intensity. Across the United States, there is significant variation in electricity prices and labor and environmental regulation. This paper uses a regression discontinuity approach to examine whether the basic logic of comparative advantage can explain the geographical clustering of U.S. manufacturing. Using a unified empirical framework, we document that energy-intensive industries concentrate in low electricity price counties, labor-intensive industries avoid pro-union counties, and pollution-intensive industries locate in counties featuring relatively lax Clean Air Act regulation. We use our estimates to predict the likely jobs impacts of regional carbon mitigation efforts.
ER  -