ABSTRACT
In Chapter 3, we analyse the process of regional convergence. Three main approaches which make use of the concepts of the β convergence, stochastic convergence, and HMM-based convergence respectively are applied to three different in their economic nature cases of the US states, Chinese provinces, and Polish voivodships. Interestingly, the three countries reacted differently to the global financial crisis which can be observed in the difference in the rate of convergence before and after the global crisis. We present the estimates of the three different approaches which also yield different conclusions. Those, however, are not contradictory but instead they are related to the different aspects of economic growth paths. Quite surprisingly, the convergence on the regional level is in most cases not as strong as it could be expected given the easiness of the flows of the physical and human capital as well as technical thought within a single country. The chapter is summarized with an attempt to explain the differences that arise across countries and approaches.
