Are the log-growth rates of city sizes normally distributed? Empirical evidence for the US

Ramos, Arturo (2015): Are the log-growth rates of city sizes normally distributed? Empirical evidence for the US.

Abstract

We study the decennial log-growth population rate distributions of the US incorporated places (resp., all places) for the period 1990-2000 (resp. 2000-2010) and the recently constructed US City Clustering Algorithm (CCA) population data in the period 1991-2000. It is obtained an excellent parametric description of these log-growth rates by means of a newly introduced distribution called “double mixture exponential Generalized Beta 2”. The normal distribution is not the one empirically observed for the same datasets.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: urban log-growth rates distribution, exponential distribution, exponential Generalized Beta 2 distribution, US population log-growth rates
• Subjects: C - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods > C4 - Econometric and Statistical Methods: Special Topics > C46 - Specific Distributions ; Specific Statistics; R - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics > R1 - General Regional Economics > R11 - Regional Economic Activity: Growth, Development, Environmental Issues, and Changes; R - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics > R1 - General Regional Economics > R12 - Size and Spatial Distributions of Regional Economic Activity

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