Producer Services Research in the United Kingdom

Abstract

This paper reviews recent research in the United Kingdom on producer services and suggests directions for further research. A recurrent theme in UK-based geographic research into producer services is the role of service activities, establishments, and trade in uneven development of the UK space economy, a role manifested in uneven provision and quality of services in peripheral regions. During the 1980s, overall growth in demand for producer services and the rapid rise in metropolitan London real estate costs reduced London's dominance, but these trends moderated by the end of the decade. In the absence of adequate government ststistics, regular and standardized surveys are needed to compile a time series of service change in the United Kingdom. Directions for continued empirical research include the role of producer services in innovation and technology transfer, the implications of information technology for the locadon of employment in the sector, and the impacts of productivity increases on employment and wages.

Strategic and Functional Orientation of Small and Medium Sized Enterprises in Professional Services: An Analysis of Public Accountancy

“…Research on the rapidly growing producer service sector that includes professional and business services is numerous [Bryson et nl., 1993a[Bryson et nl., , 1993bBryson, 1997;Coffey, 1995;Cofley and Drolet, 1996;Daniels el al., 1992;Daniels, 1995;Edvardsson el L I~. , 1993: Harrington, 1995a and199%;Hitchens, 1997;O'Farrell et al 1993O'Farrell et al , 1996Vandermerwe and Chadwick, 19891.…”

Understanding the role of business services and growth: issues in modeling regional patterns

“…However, the influence of the inertia on variations in business service dynamics across urban core counties appears weak at best as indicated by the insignificant coefficient on INER variable, a proxy for business relocation costs (Daniels 1995;Kyung 1994). Business services may give greater locational considerations to other advantages such as business linkages with specialized services (Daniels 1995;Marshall 1994). There is a positive correlation (Appendix Table B) between inertia and urban corporate sales.…”

“…The analysis of somewhat significant regional effects shows that the increase in the index of business service growth to be relatively greater in the Midwest compared to other regions. The slower growth of urban business services in overgrown service-oriented regions may be largely attributed to the rising negative externalities: congestion costs, high rents, lack of affordable housing, and shortage of parking (Fujita and Thisse 1996;Daniels 1995). None of the simple correlation coefficients (Appendix Table B) are greater than 0.5 in magnitude, suggesting that multicollinearity is not a serious problem: a common rule of thumb is that correlations among the independent variables less than 0.70 in magnitude "do not cause difficulties" (Lind et al 2002: 515).…”

“…Thus, it is hypothesized that the pattern of business service changes across urban regions is positively associated with economic structural shifts of a core county and of its metropolitan area. Paralleling theories in contact costs, firm relocation studies indicate that companies whose relocation costs are greater than their benefits arising from contact-maintenance tend to decide against relocations (Daniels 1995;Kyung 1994). Given such effects of relocation costs, the pattern of business service changes across urban regions is hypothesized to be inversely related to the variations in their areas' inertia.…”

“…The inertia in the existing spatial pattern of business services is measured by changes in location coefficients (Harrington 1995;Hoerter and Wiseman 1988). The INER variable is a proxy for inertia based on business relocation expenses, especially those due to business linkages (Daniels 1995;Kyung 1994;Marshall 1994). A positive value for the change in the business service location coefficient (LC b ) suggests the core county's business service employment is centralizing faster than the employment average for its metropolitan area; a negative value, the core county's business service employment is decentralizing faster than its metropolitan average.…”