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arXiv · 1712.00476

Modeling the origin of urban output scaling laws

Vicky Chuqiao Yang·Andrew V. Papachristos·Daniel M. Abrams
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Abstract

Urban outputs often scale superlinearly with city population. A difficulty in understanding the mechanism of this phenomenon is that different outputs differ considerably in their scaling behaviors. Here, we formulate a physics-based model for the origin of superlinear scaling in urban outputs by treating human interaction as a random process. Our model suggests that the increased likelihood of finding required collaborations in a larger population can explain this superlinear scaling, which our model predicts to be non-power-law. Moreover, the extent of superlinearity should be greater for activities that require more collaborators. We test this model using a novel dataset for seven crime types and find strong support.

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Vicky Chuqiao Yang, Andrew V. Papachristos, Daniel M. Abrams. 2017-12-01. Modeling the origin of urban output scaling laws. https://doi.org/10.1103/physreve.100.032306

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