Structural Change in Multisector Monopolistic Competition Model

Abstract

We present a natural generalization of the Dixit-Stiglitz monopolistic competition model (DSM) — we assume that there is a continuum of industries, each of them described as in DSM, and each characterized with its own elasticity of substitution. Although firms in all industries share the same level of productivity and costs, exogenous technological progress leads to non-trivial reallocations of labor and production to industries with lower elasticities of substitution. Thus the model, despite is simplicity and the absence of additional assumptions about industry structure, generates the structural changes described in the economic growth literature.