Employment effects of digitalization in the federal states of Austria as well as in urban and rural areas

In the context of digital change, little research has been done on the effects on different areas such as urban and rural regions. Supply and demand are increasingly no longer tied to each other in terms of space. This, together with lower labour costs and property prices, argues for a revaluation of rural areas. However, there are many indications in the international literature that despite lower costs of overcoming spatial separation cities continue to gain importance and agglomeration advantages due to the increasing complexity of human labour. Against this background, this project investigates the employment effects of digitalisation at a spatially differentiated level for Austria. The aim is to achieve results for different types of regions and the individual Länder, respectively. The project investigates these effects in different aspects: Work package 1 is dedicated to an extensive study of international literature. Work package 2 analyses the current effects of digitalisation on regional labour markets in Austria. Work package 3 illustrates at a highly disaggregated spatial level the employment effects of local broadband Internet access.