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Human Geography

Karl-Johan Lundquist

Professor

Human Geography

Can foundational economy save regions in crisis?

Author

  • Mikhail Martynovich
  • Teis Hansen
  • Karl-Johan Lundquist

Summary, in English

We perform, to our best knowledge, the first systematic mapping of the foundational economy (FE) at the sub-national level by looking at the FE employment in Swedish regions between 2007 and 2016. We show that the FE itself not only suffered less than traded activities from employment decline during the Great Recession of 2007–2009 but was also a domain of substantial job creation in the post-crisis recovery. At the same time, regions with higher dependence on foundational employment were hit harder during the crisis in terms of overall labour market performance. We demonstrate that it is specific compositions of foundational and traded activities in the regional employment mix that relate differently to regional employment growth in times of crisis and recovery. Jointly, these findings allow us to contribute to the literatures on the FE and regional resilience.

Department/s

  • Department of Human Geography
  • CIRCLE

Publishing year

2023

Language

English

Pages

577-599

Publication/Series

Journal of Economic Geography

Volume

23

Issue

3

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

Oxford University Press

Topic

  • Economic Geography

Keywords

  • foundational economy
  • employment
  • crisis
  • recovery
  • resilience

Status

Published

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 1468-2710