DO STATE BORDERS EFFECT COMMUTING FLOWS - A CASE STUDY OF THE QUEENSLAND AND NEW SOUTH WALES BORDER ALONG THE TWEED RIVER

ABSTRACT

[...]in the Australian context, the constitution indicates that trade between the States shall be absolutely free1. Policymakers have the authority to make policies for their own jurisdictions and a finding that a State border acts as a barrier also implies that State policy may impact on local labour market conditions while their impacts, i.e., higher or lower unemployment rates, may not be diminished through the equalising impact of increased cross border commuting (Marston, 1985). While there are a number of implications of border effects, if they exist, a brief search of the regional science literature indicates a paucity of research on this topic in Australia. [...]this paper addresses an important research gap of interest for a number of different reasons. Besides providing details of the flows between SA2s, this data has been used to derive estimates of the size of the origin and potential destination regions (in terms of the numbers of employed people), both of which are variables frequently incorporated in spatial interaction models.