AN EXAMINATION OF THE EXTENT AND IMPACT OF THE DISPERSION OF MANUFACTURING EMPLOYMENT.

摘要

Scope and Method of Study. This dissertation examines the process of economic development at the community level. The literature on the location and dispersion of economic activity is reviewed. The changing location of manufacturing employment in Oklahoma is examined both geographically by substate planning districts and demographically by city size classifications. The dispersion of employment created by new manufacturing plants is measured by an entropy index, and this index is examined statistically to ascertain any time trend. Case studies are employed to estimate the economic impact of a change in manufacturing employment on a number of towns of less than 10,000 population. The literature on the economic base model is reviewed, and the economic base multipliers are calculated and used to predict total employment change in those communities. The applicability of this method is examined by regression and the mean absolute percentage errors of the predictions. Input-output multipliers are also used to predict total employment change, and the predictions veracity is also examined by regression analysis.;The case studies found some positive difference between the growth rates of those towns with growing manufacturing sectors and the growth rates of towns without growing manufacturing sectors. Examination of the cities' economic bases allowed very good prediction of employment change with a simple one sector base model. The accuracy of this forecast was improved by 20 percent by using a multiplier derived from a ten sector input-output model.;Findings and Conclusions. Increasing equality in the shares of manufacturing employment for the various regions of the country is found to be the current trend. Similarly, the equality of manufacturing employment shares among various size classifications of cities has also been increasing. The trend is upheld in Oklahoma with the smallest third of the towns receiving the largest share of employment created by new manufacturing plants. The medium sized cities and largest cities received equal shares, but neither was as large as the share of the smallest cities.