Expansion abroad and jobs at home: Evidence from Japanese multinational enterprises

This paper examines the so-called ‘exporting job’ hypothesis – that expansion of overseas operations of manufacturing multinational enterprises (MNEs) reduces home employment – using a newly constructed matched parent-affiliate panel dataset of Japanese MNEs over the period 1991–2002. The results do not support the widely held view that overseas operations of MNEs lower home employment. On the contrary, there is some evidence that expansion of overseas operations may have helped to maintain the level of home employment.