A STRUCTURAL EMPIRICAL ANALYSIS OF METROPOLITAN LABOR DEMAND*

ABSTRACT. This paper uses a large data base to study metropolitan labor demand functions. The data are disaggregated by two-digit SICs in manufacturing for SMS As, and are corrected for changing SMSA boundaries. Labor demand elasticities are estimated for factor and commodity prices, transportation costs, state and local taxes and expenditures, and production-function shifters. Estimates from different years allow one to test Le Chatelier's principle in the context of interregional change.     

Minimum-Cost Distances in Spatial Analysis

An axiomatic approach to distance is developed which focuses on those behavioral concepts of distance related to movement in space. In particular, spatial movement by behaving units is postulated to involve a choice from among some set of abstract trips in space, and implicitly, to involve the minimization of some relevant notion of trip costs. In this context, the relevant behavioral notion of distance in space is taken to be the minimum-cost distance generated by this choice process. These trip-cost concepts extend the classical notions of paths, path lengths, and shortest paths in metric spaces. Hence many of the analytical results of the paper involve extensions of classical shortest-path distance properties to minimum-cost distances. In addition to these extensions, a characterization theorem is given which specifies the possible functional relationships between trip costs and their associated path lengths. These relationships include most functional forms which are commonly employed in the literature.