The United States as a Coastal Nation

By Jordan Rappaport and Jeffrey D. Sachs

US economic activity is overwhelmingly concentrated at its ocean and Great Lakes coasts, reflecting contribution from coastal proximity to productivity and quality of life. Extensively controlling for correlated natural attributes and initial conditions decisively rejects that the coastal concentration of economic activity spurious or just derives from historical forces long since dissipated. Measuring proximity based on c attributes that contribute to either productivity or quality of life, but not to both, suggests that the concentration derives primarily from a productivity effect but also, increasingly, from a quality of life effect.

Read more