Measure economic growth in cities and regions as well as nationally, experts recommend
12 June 2025
A new paper has suggested that examining cities and regions when it comes to research on economic growth would be more effective than looking exclusively at national data.
It argues that this shift in focus would allow researchers to better understand the effects of unequal economic growth and its political ramifications.
Written by (opens in a new window)Professor Aidan Regan from the UCD School of Politics and International Relations, and Professor Mark Blyth from Brown University in the US, the article was published in Socio-Economic Review.
The paper’s authors point out that economic growth isn’t spread evenly across countries, but is rather increasingly concentrated in larger cities within them – and that focusing too much on the national level can lead to a narrow, one-sided view.
“National averages, like GDP, hide the reality of winners and losers within countries,” explained Professor Regan.
“To understand today’s political and economic divides, we need to focus on where growth really happens. That means looking beyond the national economy to cities and regions.”
The authors highlight how in some countries, economic growth is driven by specific regions or cities, while in other countries the drivers of growth are more evenly spread.
They argue that if economic growth is unequal across a country, this will have political consequences at the national and sub-national levels.
Examples include the Brexit referendum in the UK, when regional economic inequality shaped the populist backlash that played a part in the Leave vote. The Remain campaign focuses on how trade with the EU fostered growth, inadvertently highlighting that the drivers and beneficiaries of that growth were highly concentrated in London.
The paper recommends that economic research goes beyond studying the national accounts, instead studying the places where income growth actually takes place – often at the city-regional level.
By: Rebecca Hastings, Digital Journalist, UCD University Relations
To contact the UCD News & Content Team, email: newsdesk@ucd.ie
