Annie Tubadji

Culture‐based development: empirical evidence for Germany

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to provide a comprehensive concept for the role of culture in economic growth. Design/methodology/approach - The paper overviews the culture based development (CBD) concept and its precise definition of culture as an encompassing socio-economic factor. The outlined CBD mechanism of impact is expressed in a testable empirical model. Alternative approaches for operationalizing the CBD definition of cultural capital are suggested and a real data application on intra-regional level (for German Findings - The findings illustrate the ability of the CBD model to capture the statistical significance of culture. Originality/value - The paper demonstrates the two innovative elements of the CBD approach to culture: first, measuring culture with a factor variable as a better alternative to the mono-dimensional variables inferred by the state of the art; and second, thus capturing the overall economic meaning of the cultural factor (not just one aspect of it) for local socio-economic development.

Altruism to strangers for our own sake: domestic effects from immigration A comparative analysis for EU15

Purpose - – Theoretical and empirical research on the impact of immigrants for local development is rather inconclusive regarding the direction of said impact. The purpose of this paper is to identify relationships between human capital and cultural capital, in the context of local labour market productivity. Design/methodology/approach - – As the key constituents of human capital, identified in the literature, are both the locally generated through investment in education and the inflowing through immigration human capital, the paper examines those jointly in a close-to-reality-model. To this end, the paper operationalizes and infers data on the “melting pot” of EU15, NUTS2 level. The sources of the data are the Eurostat Regional Database and the World Value Survey, which have served to construct both a cross-section for the year 2001. These data sets allows us to examine the different groups of migrating and local human capital, their interaction and joint impact on local productivity through three stage least square estimations of the simultaneous equations CBD model. Findings - – The evidence suggests that benefits from immigrants differ, not only due to their human capital, but also due to their culturally biased different bargaining power on the labour market. Originality/value - – The main advantage of the suggested model of productivity is that, in addition to accounting for the filigree composition of human capital, it also takes into consideration the cultural capital present in a locality. In this manner, the authors are able to examine the interaction between the quality of the incoming human capital and the cultural encounter context (generating the cultural “milieu” effect) of the modern diverse city.

The German miracle or the miracle of the cultural attitude: Inequality and convergence as products of culture in Germany

Purpose - – The purpose of this paper is to explore the link between redistribution, convergence and local cultural capital (as defined by culture-based development concept). Design/methodology/approach - – The paper infers the basic mechanism of the cultural dependence of convergence and inequality – through an empirical test for the case of the “German job miracle” during the current crisis. Two empirical questions are asked: first, is local income inequality associated with local cultural capital and second, is the negative convergence between East and West Germany during the crisis related to culturally sensitive employers’ preference for job preservation vs job loss. An OLS enquiry and two deeper estimation methods (a logit model and a 3SLS simultaneous equations model) are alternatively applied in order to triangulate the empirical results. Findings - – The findings support the existence of cultural effect on local income inequality and cultural path dependence of employers’ preferences for job preservation vs job loss in a condition of economic shock. Originality/value - – The paper provides both theoretical reasoning and empirical illustration of the significance of the cultural effect on human preferences which may or may not allow for redistribution and convergence between localities.

Introduction to cultural research approaches: Applications to culture and labour analysis

Purpose - – The purpose of this paper is to provide a brief introduction to the topic of cultural research approaches that are applicable for investigating the interdependence of culture and labour. The “Introduction” notes two main constraints and four main research approaches that refer to this field of scientific exploration. The authors then outline and summarize the ten studies included in the Design/methodology/approach - – The Special Issue used a double-blind review process, employing one external referee and one cross-referee for each of the ten selected papers. The papers themselves represent a wide variety of designs, methodologies, and analytical strategies used to study culture and labour. Findings - – The findings of the studies included in this Special Issue touch on culture and diversity and cultural impact on migration, as well as on culture in the workplace and willingness to work. Practical implications - – Each article also draws attention to practical implications with regard to cultural impact for the particular country and/or regions examined in the study. Originality/value - – Together, the papers in this Special Issue help to make a clear distinction in macro- and micro-cultural economic research by shedding innovative light on the study of culture and labour from an international and interdisciplinary perspective.

Immigrants’ socio-economic achievements and cultural diversity : Economic effects of individual and local cultural capital

Purpose An interest in social transmission as a source of welfare and income inequality in a society has re-emerged recently with new vigour in leading economic research (see Piketty, 2014). This paper presents a mixed Bourdieu-Mincer (B-M) type micro-economic model which provides a testable mechanism for culturally biased socio-economic inter-generational transmission. In particular, the operationalisation of this mixed B-M type model seeks to find evidence for individual and local cultural capital effects on the economic achievements, in addition to the human capital effect, for both migrants and locals in the Netherlands. The purpose of this paper is to examine two sources of wage differential in the local labour market, namely: individual cultural capital (approximated by immigrant background), which affects schooling results; and the local cultural capital (approximated with the cultural milieu), which directly biases the selection of employees. Design/methodology/approach The study utilises the 2007-2009 data set for higher professional education (in Dutch termed HBO) graduates registered in the Maastricht database. The Mincer-type equation is augmented with a control variable for the local cultural milieu. The authors cope with this model empirically by means of 2SLS and 3SLS methods. Findings The authors find convincing evidence for the existence of both an individual cultural capital and a local cultural capital effect on schooling and wage differentials. This can be interpreted as a migrant background effect leading to a disadvantaged position on the labour market due to less frequently attending high-quality secondary schools. Originality/value More importantly, the authors find evidence for a classical Myrdalian effect of self-fulfilling prophecy, in which graduates with second-generation migrant background have a disadvantaged position due to access only to poorer quality of schooling.