This paper contributes to the empirical literature on the magnitude of the network effects of public infrastructures, introducing a novel approach. After estimating the dynamics common to time series for the regional public capital stock, coordinated policy shocks are identified within a properly specified structural VEC model. The findings confirm previous evidence that transport infrastructures exert positive macroeconomic effects in the long run. At the same time, it is shown that this effect is attributable mostly to the impact of coordinated public policy shocks, as the literature on network externalities predicts.
Published in 2012 in: Papers in Regional Science, v. 91, 3, pp. 515-541
