Gabriel M Ahlfeldt

The Price of Productivity by Gabriel M. Ahlfeldt, Stephan Heblich, Tobias Seidel, and Fan Yin

Focus and Research Question The study asks whether the productivity advantages of cities – known as agglomeration effects – are reflected not only in higher wages but also in higher commercial rents. It examines whether focusing on wages alone understates the true economic benefits of large cities.

Data and Measurement The researchers build a new commercial rent index for Germany using five million property listings from 2007 to 2024. They measure rents at a fine geographic level and identify central business districts (CBDs) as areas with unusually high economic density.

Methodological Approach They estimate how commercial rents decline with distance from the CBD and how CBD rents increase with city size. To identify causal effects, they use historical population as an instrument for current city size.

🏙️ Do big cities boost productivity more than we think?

A study shows the benefits of urban density are reflected not only in higher wages, but also in higher commercial rents. Ignoring rent effects may underestimate the true economic gains of large cities.
berlinschoolofeconomics.de/about-us/new...

Chinesische Kaffeekette startet mit Dumpingpreisen Billig, schnell, per App: Mit "Cotti Coffee" startet eine chinesische Kaffeekette in Berlin. Der erste Standort an der Friedrichstraße setzt auf Niedrigpreise und hohe Frequenz. Die Branche fragt sich...

📺 On @rbb24.de, @ahlfeldt.bsky.social discussed the entry of low-price coffee chains.

☕ He argued market-wide price declines are unlikely, as cafés compete beyond price. Current pricing may not be sustainable, though part of productivity gains reaches consumers.

👉 www.rbb-online.de/abendschau/v...

☕Kaffee für alle oder schicke Cafés für coole Kieze? 🤎 Wir diskutieren live zur prime time in der @rbb24.de Abendschau @humboldtuni.bsky.social @bsoeberlin.bsky.social Interview: box.hu-berlin.de/f/3b351d1660... Ganzer Ganzer Beitrag: www.rbb-online.de/abendschau/v...

The Price of Productivity by Gabriel Ahlfeldt (HU Berlin, LSE), Stephan Heblich (University of Toronto), Tobias Seidel (University of Duisburg-Essen), Fan Yin (HU Berlin)

"The price of productivity is not paid in wages alone. A large share is paid in rents." Our @bsoeberlin.bsky.social INSIGHTS piece summarizes why considering commercial rent capitalization is important to properly estimating agglomeration effects. berlinschoolofeconomics.de/insight/the-...

And thanks a ton to our friends at the FDZ at @rwi.bsky.social @phibre.bsky.social for making available the raw data - what a service to the spatial economics in Germany!

And here it is, the first micro-geographic commercial rent index for Germany in its full beauty. Maps of top-12 German cities in the online supplement of the paper...
@heblich.bsky.social

The agglomeration elasticity may be larger than widely believed (if we account for capitalization in commercial floor space prices). And the first micro-geographic commercial rent index for Germany!!! 😎 @bsoeberlin.bsky.social DP: opus4.kobv.de/opus4-hsog/f... Data: github.com/Ahlfeldt/AHS...

How Architecture Creates Economic Value Beyond Buildings by Gabriel M. Ahlfeldt, Elisabetta Pietrostefani, and Ailin Zhang

Focus and Research Question The paper asks how much “good architecture” is worth economically, and whether markets deliver too little of it. The key issue is that design benefits can extend beyond the building itself.

Why markets may underprovide design High-quality design can create spillovers — benefits to neighbors and the wider area that the developer cannot fully charge for. This can lead to less investment in design than is socially desirable.

Evidence base and data The authors synthesise evidence from many empirical studies linking architectural design to property prices and rents. They distinguish between effects on the designed building itself and effects on nearby buildings.

🏙️ Is “good #architecture” just aesthetics – or real #economic value?

👥 A new #paper by @ahlfeldt.bsky.social, E. Pietrostefani, and A. Zhang shows how distinctive design can raise prices not only for one building, but also for its neighbourhood.

📑 berlinschoolofeconomics.de/about-us/new...

Berlin School of Economics | INSIGHTS pieces (with INSIGHTS logo) title: The Economics of Architecture pictures of the authors Gabriel Ahlfedlt, Elisabetta Pietrostefani, Ailin Zhang background: city skyline merges with financial data, reflecting economic growth and urban development

🏙️ The #Economics of #Architecture

@ahlfeldt.bsky.social, Elisabetta Pietrostefani & Ailin Zhang bring architectural quality into urban & welfare economics, documenting spillovers, heterogeneous preferences & a coordination problem in design investment.
👇
berlinschoolofeconomics.de/insight/the-...

Good architecture is a posterchild public good: non-rival and non-excludable. Had great fun using the economics toolbox to study why developments look rather underwhelming and simulate what policies could lead to more beautiful cities. @bsoeberlin.bsky.social github.com/Ahlfeldt/DPs...

Assessed values are good for quantification of QSMs. List prices better for hedonic valuation using panel identification. Evidence and replication studies from the NL and NYC in our @cep-lse.bsky.social DP! cep.lse.ac.uk/_NEW/PUBLICA...

Ever wondered what housing value proxy for sales prices to use? Long story (in our @cesifo.org DP) short: Assessed values are good for quantification of QSMs. List prices better for hedonic valuation using panel identification. www.ifo.de/en/cesifo/pu... @hans-koster.bsky.social

How can traditional models fall short in measuring urban appeal? Our analysis reveals that neglecting mobility frictions causes an underestimation of the urban quality-of-life premium (QoL): increasing a region's population is associated with a significant increase in QoL.

190researchblog.subs...

So proud of her! 🍾

#WIFO Research Seminar with @ahlfeldt.bsky.social (@humboldtuni.bsky.social) – The Geography of Life: Evidence from Copenhagen

This seminar will take place on 24 September 2025 at 12:40 pm.

Register now: veranstaltungen@wifo.ac.at

▶️ Join us buff.ly/K1fQU4A

.@hertieschool.bsky.social & IfW Kiel are jointly 🚨 recruiting a Professor of International Economics🚨 (Associate/Full).

👉 apply.interfolio.com/169770

Great opportunity to join Berlin's thriving econ community. No kings here.

Deadline: Sep 30, 2025

Please share widely! #EconSky

I am too young to get nostalgic (at least I pretend), but 10 years after the "Berlin Wall" paper and with 15 years newer data I realize two things: 1) The Berlin spatial structure did not change that much 2) how much more convenient it has gotten to collect land values 😀 @reddingecon.bsky.social

www.bqse.de Photocredit: wirestock

UPDATE: more impression from the epic www.bqse.de boat event: sites.google.com/view/bqse/bq... Thanks to @humboldtuni.bsky.social Innovation #HumboldtInnovation for facilitating!

What a fabulous 2025 @bsoeberlin.bsky.social www.bqse.de seminar season it has been! Thanks to all the co-organizers, our manager @immanuelfeld.bsky.social , all speakers, guests, and locals! You have been a fantastic spatial community! sites.google.com/view/bqse/bq...

@dimitriafreitas.bsky.social @ninaglaeser.bsky.social

Last day of the @bsoeberlin.bsky.social course in Quantitative Spatial Economics. What a great cohort! If you spot any of these faces on the job market, don't hesitate! Thoroughly impressed by their coursework—the nerdy discussions during the lectures: priceless! 🫰 sites.google.com/view/bqse/bq... f

I agree!

Yep, I agree and thought it would be nice to show. With a spatially random holdout sample, RF clearly wins as expected...

OLS, unlike RF can extrapolate spatial trends! Already looking forward to teaching it!

Preparing my Applied Econometrics course @humboldtuni.bsky.social using
@gaborbekes.bsky.social
great textbook gabors-data-analysis.com. Added a nerdy exercise to the application of Random Forrest to predicting Airbnb prices. OLS beats Random Forrest when predicting outside a spatial window!

A new measure reveals the benefits of living in urban areas

@ahlfeldt.bsky.social Fabian Bald, Duncan Roth, Tobias Seidel

In CentrePiece magazine
Editor: @helen-ward1.bsky.social


http://cep.lse.ac.uk...

The 2025 season of the @bsoeberlin.bsky.social QSE course is running. Here is how it is going: sites.google.com/view/bqse/bq.... And here is my latest toy for the current cohort and anyone else. Maybe the simplest way of computing travel time matrices, designed for noobs! github.com/Ahlfeldt/TTM...

🏙️ The 14th European Meeting of the @urbaneconomics.bsky.social at @humboldtuni.bsky.social , marked a significant milestone as the largest in-person European meeting to date and over 200 paper presentations selected 📑👥👥

Discover more insights 👉 berlinschoolofeconomics.de/about-us/new...

#UEA2025

Thanks to all presenters and discussants. So far, it seems to be going well (touch wood), thanks to our fantastic teams of true organizers! @bsoeberlin.bsky.social

Does it take extra skills to work in a large city? This paper explores the relationship between job complexity and agglomeration. For this, we assess whether vacancies in larger cities require more ski…

Does it take extra skills to work in a large city? 🌆

In this new paper, we analyse online job vacancy data and find that jobs in large cities require more skills and a more diverse skill set, indicating a higher job complexity.

Open-acces paper: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...