Cities in the developing world

This volume takes as its primary theme the design of city-level policy for more efficient and equitable urban growth in developing countries. Such an analysis must begin with a diagnosis of the problem of urban policy in developing countries, which can be summarized as consisting of two inter- related phenomena. First, urban labor supply tends to expand as rapidly, if not in fact more rapidly, than urban labor demand; this limits the growth of urban wages and incomes, especially for unskilled workers. Second, the demand for urban services (including transport, housing, and public services) expands more rapidly than their supply; this leads to rising prices for urban land and housing, overcrowded housing, and shortages of public services, all of which affect the urban poor especially. Since these imbalances are largely the result of inefficient management of labor demand and service supply by
governments, the efficiency and equity of urban development can be increased by improving the policies that create the imbalances. The present volume also analyzes policies concerning urban labor supply and conditions of service demand in considerable detail. The principal conclusions can be briefly summarized ..