Export,R&D and new products. a model and a test on European industries

In this article we extend the model developed by Bogliacino and Pianta (Industrial and Corporate Change 22 649, 2013, b) on the link between R&D, innovation and economic performance, considering the impact of innovation on export success. We develop a simultaneous three equation model in order to investigate the existence of a ‘virtuous circle’ between industries’ R&D, share of product innovators and export market shares. We investigate empirically – at the industry level – three key relationships affecting the dynamics of innovation and export performance: first, the capacity of firms to translate their R&D efforts in new products; second, the role of innovation as a determinant of export market shares; third, the export success as a driver of new R&D efforts. The model is tested for 38 manufacturing and service sectors of six European countries over three time periods, from 1995 to 2010. The model effectively accounts for the dynamics of R&D efforts, innovation and international performance of European industries. Moreover, important differences across countries emerge when we split our sample into a Northern group – Germany, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom – and a Southern group – France, Italy and Spain. We find that the ‘virtuous circle’ between innovation and competitiveness holds for Northern economies only, while Southern industries fail to translate innovation efforts into export success.     

Demand and innovation in productivity growth

The labour productivity impact of demand and innovation is investigated in this paper combining insights from the Kaldorian and Schumpeterian traditions. After a review of studies in such traditions, a general model is proposed for explaining productivity growth in European manufacturing and service industries in the late 1990s, followed by two distinct specifications for the industries oriented toward product innovation, and for those where process innovation dominates. The empirical analysis is based on the match of the SIEPI‐CIS2 database developed at the University of Urbino and Eurostat Input–Output Tables at the industry level, for 22 manufacturing sectors and 10 services sectors. Six European countries are considered: Germany, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal and the United Kingdom. The results show that productivity growth in European industries can be explained by a combination of technology factors and demand dynamics, confirming the complementarity of technology and demand effects. On the demand side, household consumption emerges as the most pervasive component of demand, able to stimulate greater efficiency in all manufacturing and service industries. Investment also has a role, focused however on the capital goods producing industries. On the technology side, the mechanisms of productivity growth are fundamentally different in the industries oriented towards product innovation and in those dominated by process innovation. This evidence supports the view that innovation in firms and industries can be associated to two contrasting strategies, searching either for technological competitiveness, through knowledge generation, product innovation and expansion of new markets, or aiming at greater cost competitiveness, through job reductions, labour saving investment, flexibility and restructuring.     

Employment Effects of Product and Process Innovation in Europe

This paper develops a model of the employment impact of innovation considering, on the one hand, the interactions with demand and labour costs and, on the other, the variety of patterns of technological change. Different technological strategies are considered. First, a search for technological competitiveness is based on product innovation and productivity rooted in quality advantages; second a strategy of active price competitiveness has productivity growth rooted in process innovation-based restructuring; third a passive price competitiveness strategy is pursued by non-innovators relying on cost-cutting. The new European innovation database drawn from the Community Innovation Survey 1994-96, merged with structural and macroeconomic data 1994-99 drawn from the OECD are analysed at a sectoral level across eight European countries: Italy, France, Germany, Denmark, Netherlands, Finland, the UK, and Sweden. The innovation survey data provide information on several quantitative and qualitative aspects of firms' innovative activities. A comparison of the results from the first (1990-92) and second (1994-96) Community innovation survey data is also carried out. The results show that, in the last decade, technological change has had a major impact on employment in manufacturing industry, associated with the dominance of an active price competitiveness strategy.     

企业异质性、出口对工资溢价的影响——基于中国工业企业微观数据的经验证据

本文以企业异质性理论为基础，揭示了企业异质性、出口对工资溢价的影响机理。基于中国工业企业微观数据，对企业异质性、出口对工资溢价的影响进行了实证检验。研究结果表明：(1)企业异质性对工资溢价有显著的影响。其中企业创新能力、企业生产率、资本密集度与技术密集度、企业绩效对工资溢价有显著的正向影响，企业创新能力越强、生产率水平越高、绩效越好，其工资溢价越明显。(2)出口、出口补贴能够带来显著的工资溢价，工资溢价与出口密集度、出口补贴强度呈倒U型关系。(3)人力资本(员工受教育水平、职称、技能)对工资溢价有显著的正向影响。人力资本水平越高，其工资溢价越明显。此外，大型企业、中央直属企业、外资企业、沿海企业均存在明显的工资溢价。这一研究结果有着重要的政策启示。     

浅析欧债危机对中国外贸的影响及对策

欧盟是我国第一大贸易伙伴和第一大出口市场.随着欧债危机持续恶化,欧债危机已经席卷整个欧元区,由希腊蔓延至西班牙、意大利等国.在这场经济风暴中,我国对欧洲的产品出口也受到严重的影响.通过分析欧债危机的现状和原因,我们发现此次危机对我国对欧贸易的影响主要体现在欧元汇率、欧洲市场需求的萎缩和欧洲市场挤出效应等方面.欧元汇率持续下跌,给以欧元作为结算单位的中国企业带来很大的汇兑风险,许多中小企业出口利润都淹没在汇率风险中.而欧洲市场需求的萎缩和欧洲市场挤出效应使我国的对欧贸易严重受挫.我国外销企业只有及时调整产业结构、不断开拓市场和防范汇率波动风险,才能抵御欧债危机的影响.     

产业政策对企业全要素生产率的作用机制——基于国家自主创新示范区的准自然实验

产业政策能否提升企业全要素生产率是产业经济领域的重要问题。采用准自然实验方法，利用国家自主创新示范区相关数据研究产业政策对企业全要素生产率的影响。结果发现，总体上产业政策能够显著提升区内企业全要素生产率，但不同所有制企业对产业政策的吸收程度不同。相较于国有企业，非国有企业更容易受产业政策激励，进而提升全要素生产率。进一步研究显示，产业政策作用程度和企业所处行业对全要素生产率的影响不同，产业政策能够显著提升重点扶持企业和资本密集型企业全要素生产率。将技术创新作为产业政策和企业全要素生产率的中介变量，分析表明，90%的产业政策均通过技术创新作用于企业全要素生产率，政府可以通过技术创新这一手段实施有针对性的产业政策，从而提升企业全要素生产率。     

The effects of education and aging in an OLG model: long-run growth in France,Germany and Italy

The purpose of the paper is to provide a long-run analysis up to 2050 of the interplay between financial integration, diverging labor productivity, and the aging process in the larger European countries. We use the Prometeia overlapping generation model for Italy, Germany, and France which are modeled as open economies in capital markets. Our projections provide a core-periphery structure in which Germany, the most abundant human capital country, shows the highest but a decreasing growth rate due to pronounced aging, and finances capital accumulation processes in France and Italy. We find that financial trends are reversed in the late 2010s when Italy begins to over-save as the gap in human capital endowment, and then in productivity, becomes larger compared to the other two countries. This leads to a reduction in physical capital accumulation and innovation processes in Italy. We employ fiscal experiments to correct the long-run divergent behavior of countries in order to get a more homogeneous growth rate path among countries. We also measure the impact of taxation on net-wealth in Italy, and evaluate the internal and spillover effects.     

Diversity in innovation and productivity in Europe

The diversity in innovation patterns across manufacturing and service industries and in their outcomes in terms of hourly labor productivity are investigated in this article considering six European countries. The Schumpeterian insights into the variety of innovation are developed in this work by identifying different innovation–performance relationships for industries and countries, relying either on the dominant role of product innovation, or on the diffusion of process improvements. Moreover, the “push” effect of innovation is combined with the “pull” effect of demand, by considering the impact of the dynamics of consumption and investment at the sectoral level. The results point out a “North-South” divide across EU countries, with the three countries of Northern Europe closely associated to the model of productivity growth based on product innovation, and the three Southern countries, mainly relying on the mechanisms by which process innovation is at the root of productivity improvements.     

The Law of One Price: further empirical evidence concerning Italy and the United Kingdom

The main purpose of this paper is to perform a disaggregated test on the empirical validity of the Law-of-one-price Hypothesis in the sector of manufacturing for two industrial countries, Italy and the United Kingdom, during the period 1973–80. The findings show that Italian export prices are much less related to British export prices than is usually suggested by contemporary balance-of-payments and exchange rate theoretical literature assuming the Law of One Price.     

China’s competition and the export price strategies of developed countries

This paper analyzes the impact of Chinese competition on developed countries’ export prices. The empirical application is on Italy, one of the main European manufacturing exporters with exports at high risk of competition from China. Our results show that, following China’s entry into the WTO, the price strategies of Italian firms has been affected. While in general the increasing Chinese export competition resulted in an upgrading of products exported, the impact has been different according to the sector and technological level. The incentives to upgrade have been stronger for low technology sectors, where competition is tougher and varieties of products sold lower. To highlight quality differentials, and isolate the effects on the different segments of the distribution of Italy’s export prices, we run quantile regressions. We find that are mainly those products sold at low prices to face a strong pressure to upgrade.     

Environmental efficiency and labour productivity: Trade-off or joint dynamics? A theoretical investigation and empirical evidence from Italy using NAMEA

In this paper we test an adapted EKC hypothesis to verify the relationship between ‘environmental efficiency’ (namely emissions per unit of value added) and labour productivity (value added per employee). We exploit NAMEA data on Italy for 29 sector branches and 6 categories of air emissions for the period 1991-2001. We employ data on capital stock and trade openness to test the robustness of our results.On the basis of the theoretical and empirical analyses focusing on innovation, firm performances and environmental externalities, we would expect a positive correlation between environmental efficiency and labour productivity — a negative correlation between the emissions intensity of value added and labour productivity — which departs from the conventional mainstream view. The hypothesis tested is a critical one within the longstanding debate on the potential trade-off or complementarity between environmental preservation and economic performance, which is strictly associated with the role of technological innovation. We find that for most air emission categories there is a positive relationship between labour productivity and environmental efficiency. Labour productivity dynamics, then, seem to be complementary to a decreasing emissions intensity in the production process. Taking a disaggregate sector perspective, we show that the macro-aggregate evidence is driven by sector dynamics in a non-homogenous way across pollutants. Services tend always to show a ‘complementary’ relationship, while industry seems to be associated with inverted U-shape dynamics for greenhouse gases and nitrogen oxides. This is in line with our expectations. In any case, EKC shapes appear to drive such productivity links towards complementarity. The extent to which this evidence derives from endogenous market forces, industrial and structural change, and policy effects is discussed by taking an evolutionary perspective to innovation and by referring to impure public goods arguments.     

Export performance of the Asian miracle economies: The role of innovation and product variety

Traditional export models fall short of explaining the marked increase in exports of the Asian miracle economies in the post‐WWII period. A model showing that exports are driven by innovations, innovative competitiveness, demand and price competitiveness is estimated for China, India, Korea, Japan, Singapore and Taiwan over the period 1953–2010. The results demonstrate that innovation stocks and competitiveness are important determinants behind their success. Furthermore, innovation stocks and innovative competitiveness are shown to be less influential for export growth in China and India and their export booms have been fuelled by process rather than product innovation.     

金融支持、研发创新与出口复杂度——基于中国高新技术产业价值链的分析

随着中国的产业结构迎来了转型升级的历史契合点,高新技术产品出口成为了中国未来外贸交易的发展方向。影响中国高新技术产品出口复杂度的因素有许多,可是探讨金融支持和研发创新对出口复杂度影响的文献却不多。本文收集了从2008年到2018年期间的相关数据,构建了面板模型研究了金融支持和研发创新对出口复杂度的影响,结果发现：金融支持、研发创新以及两者的交互变量均与出口复杂度呈现出了正相关关系。在中国不同地区,金融支持和研发创新还是与出口复杂度呈现出了正相关关系,可是影响程度存在差异。金融支持可以通过研发创新对出口复杂度产生间接影响,但是研发创新不可以通过金融支持对出口复杂度产生间接影响。     

Productivity,innovation strategies and industrial relations in SMEs. Empirical evidence for a local production system in northern Italy

The paper aims to provide an original contribution to evaluating several kinds of relations between four areas of innovation activities – training, technology, organization, ICT (information and communication technologies) – and industrial relations and firm’s economic performance. Quantitative evidence for a SME‐based local production system is provided by exploiting two datasets: the first is derived from a direct survey carried out in 2005 collecting data on innovations, labour flexibility and industrial relations; the second is represented by a panel of official balance sheets data for the period 1998–2004. The analysis is divided in two consequential parts. We first examine the drivers of different innovation strategies and subsequently we exploit innovation indicators as potential drivers of firm’s productivity. The results show that training activities and organizational changes have strong links with many industrial relations indicators, thus emerging as industrial relations driven innovations. On the contrary, ICT and technological innovation seem to be more influenced by firms’ past performances than by industrial relations. The analysis on labour productivity drivers shows that training activities are the most relevant factors; then, ranked consequently, technological innovation, organisational innovations and, finally, ICT also appear to impact on productivity levels. It is worth noting that the role of ICT emerges more robustly when endogeneity is specifically addressed. Finally, the role of firm size seems here to be overshadowed by other drivers.     

Trade Policy and Productivity Growth in OECD Manufacturing *

Trade liberalization may promote economic growth in a number of ways, including by accelerating the rate of technological change. Firms that face more intense import competition may be spurred to greater rates of innovation; firms which export may absorb new technologies through their contact with international markets. This paper examines evidence on trade policy and productivity growth for a sample of thirteen OECD countries and including eighteen manufacturing sectors, using data primarily from the 1980s. Within individual sectors, there are strong productivity convergence effects within the OECD. After controlling for convergence, we find a positive association between high rates of productivity growth and low tariffs, and between high productivity growth and strong export performance. We found no particular association between high productivity growth and import penetration. The results are consistent with the possibility of positive linkages between trade liberalization and accelerated productivity growth. [F1, O4]     

Austrian exporters: unique or alike? New insights and missing puzzle pieces

In this paper we provide detailed evidence on the performance of exporters compared to non-exporters in Austrian manufacturing industries based on firm-level data. The centrepiece of the study is the issue of the export premium, i.e. the size and productivity advantages of exporting firms compared to their purely domestic peers. We present evidence for the existence of sales, labour productivity and wage premia. These results are largely in line with the results found for other European countries. Furthermore we document the existence of large differences in these premia across industries and provide explanations for this finding. Our results are robust with regards to including additional firm control variables such as employment and R&D-related variables though the magnitudes of the export premia become much smaller. We also propose a new interpretation of the export premium estimation with firm fixed effects which we interpret as a result on export switchers. Finally, we employ a probit model to document the importance of sunk export costs for the decision to export.     

THE IMPACT OF DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN COMPETITION ON SECTORAL GROWTH: A CROSS‐COUNTRY ANALYSIS

This paper examines the impact of competition on the total factor productivity (TFP) of 21 manufacturing sectors in eighteen OECD countries over the period of time 1990–2006. We assume that the source of TFP growth can be either domestic or foreign innovation or technology transfer from the technological frontier. Trade openness, R&D, and human capital can have two effects: a direct effect on TFP (e.g., through innovation) and an indirect effect depending on the productivity gap between a given country and the technological frontier. We find that tougher domestic competition is always associated with higher sectoral productivity. Both import and export penetrations are positively associated with an increase of TFP. However, the channels through which higher TFP is materialized are different: export penetration works through level effect, while import penetration acts mainly when conditional on the level of technological development. The economical magnitude of the effect is not trivial.     

技术创新、空间溢出与长江经济带工业绿色全要素生产率

加快工业绿色发展进程是推动长江经济带高质量发展的重要内容。运用SBM-DDF模型和Luenberger分析方法,测算长江经济带沿线108个地级及以上城市工业绿色全要素生产率,考察技术创新贡献程度,综合运用泰尔指数、收敛分析、空间自相关方法检验地区差异和空间溢出。研究发现：长江经济带工业绿色全要素生产率整体呈上升趋势,技术创新改进和技术规模效率是工业绿色发展的重要驱动力;长江经济带沿线城市工业绿色全要素生产率呈现明显的空间异质性和空间溢出效应。但随着空间距离增加,空间溢出效应逐步减弱。推动长江经济带工业绿色发展,应综合运用差异化措施促进工业技术创新,加快共性技术研发、合作研发与推广,进一步提高长江经济带工业绿色全要素生产率。     

制造业企业出口和生产率的关系——新新贸易理论框架下对中国工业企业的微观分析

在新新贸易理论的框架下,对中国规模以上工业企业从总体和分行业两个方面检验中国工业企业出口对生产率增长的影响,发现出口同企业全要素生产率增长显著负相关.造成出口效应不显著的原因除了中国尚不完善的市场体系外,还与中国出口贸易中加工贸易比重过高、加工环节大都处于劳动密集型而且技术含量不高的水平、加工过程短、增值率不高有关.因此,中国如果减少加工贸易的出口,便可以在不影响生产率增长的基础上降低外部需求.     

出口贸易是否提高了我国企业的生产率?——基于中国2007年制造业企业数据的检验

文章在新—新贸易理论的框架下,选取了2007年我国30多万家制造业企业样本,从总体和分行业两个方面检验了我国出口贸易对于企业生产率的影响,结果显示其不但没有积极作用,反而存在负面效应,这其中的原因可能是我国加工贸易企业较多、出口企业的惰性以及我国国内市场进入成本较高引起的。由此,我国企业应该重视提高对外贸易的质量,加快结构转型和产业升级,发挥出口贸易对于企业生产率以及经济可持续发展的积极作用。