The impact of Objective 1 funds on regional growth convergence in the EU: a panel-data approach

Abstract

This article investigates the impact of Objective 1 structural funds expenditure on EU regions by estimating an augmented conditional convergence econometric model. According to this model, growth convergence is influenced by the policy treatment, which affects the regional initial investment rate by interacting with other regional structural variables and eventually influencing its steady state level. The convergence model is specified in a dynamic panel-data form and estimated using a database of 206 EU15 regions observed from 1989 to 2000. A GMM estimation is applied to obtain consistent estimates of both parameter b and impact of the Objective 1 policies.