Outsourcing,Importing and Innovation: Evidence from Firm‐level Data for Emerging Economies

This paper investigates two sourcing strategies of firms, outsourcing and importing, and links these to innovation activities. The authors examine this empirically using firm‐level data for 28 emerging market economies and find robust evidence that outsourcing increases the likelihood to spend on R&D and via this channel raises innovation output, whereas importing increases innovation output, but not R&D. The results hold when implementing an instrumental variables approach. It is found that results crucially depend on the institutional environment in the economy, e.g. property rights and intellectual property rights protection. The results suggest that better institutions magnify the gains from importing, but not from outsourcing. EU countries also reap additional positive innovation effects from importing compared with non‐EU countries.     

Explaining Export Performance through Inputs: Evidence from Aggregated Cross‐country Firm‐level Data

Which trade barrier related to intermediate inputs forms a greater burden on the export performance of firms in developing countries? Using aggregated cross‐country firm‐level data covering 43 mostly developing economies, this paper estimates the marginal importance of the impact of various intermediate input trade cost barriers, namely tariffs, non‐tariff barriers (NTBs) and services barriers, on firms' export behavior. In a cross‐sectoral setting, this paper takes the firm's export performance in goods as a central focus to study the effects of these different trade barriers through the exporting firm's choice of use of intermediate inputs. The results show that the most significant trade barriers on inputs that impede export performance in developing countries are mainly NTBs and restrictions of services.     

Does Trade Credit Substitute Bank Credit? Evidence from Firm‐level Data

The paper examines micro data on Italian manufacturing firms' inventory behaviour to test the Meltzer (1960) hypothesis according to which firms substitute bank credit with trade credit (TC) during money tightening. We find that inventory investment of Italian manufacturing firms is constrained by their availability of TC and that this effect more than doubles during monetary restrictions. As for the magnitude of the substitution effect, however, we find that it is not sizeable. This is in line with the micro theories of TC and the evidence on actual firm practices, according to which credit terms display modest variations over time .     

Multinational Enterprises,Absorptive Capacity and Export Spillovers: Evidence from Polish Firm‐level Data

An important benefit attributed to the activity of multinational enterprises (MNEs) in developing and transition countries is its effect on international market access. Through a variety of channels the presence of MNEs is expected to reduce the costs faced by indigenous firms in breaking into international markets and in turn boost their export prospects. In this paper we use an extensive Polish firm‐level dataset for the period 2000–2008 to verify whether MNEs have positively contributed to the export performance of indigenous firms. We track not only sectoral and geographical spillovers stemming from the activity of MNEs but also control for firm‐specific characteristics that affect indigenous firms' decisions to export including their absorptive capacity. Our empirical results support the existence of positive spillovers (related to MNE export activity) at the sectoral level but not at the regional level. Finally, we find that individual absorptive capacity determines the size of export spillovers.     

Can Production Subsidies Explain China's Export Performance? Evidence from Firm‐level Data*

This paper analyses the relationship between production subsidies and firms’ export performance using a very comprehensive and recent firm‐level database and controlling for the endogeneity of subsidies. It documents robust evidence that production subsidies stimulate export activity at the intensive margin, although this effect is conditional on firm characteristics. In particular, the positive relationship between subsidies and the intensive margin of exports is strongest among profit‐making firms, firms in capital‐intensive industries, and those located in non‐coastal regions. Compared to firm characteristics, the extent of heterogeneity across ownership structure (SOEs, collectives, and privately owned firms) proves to be relatively less important.     

外包与生产率:基于工业行业数据的经验研究

本文使用投入产出表的数据计算了我国35个工业行业的外包比率,并以面板数据模型检验了外包对全员劳动生产率的影响;为验证其中的机理,进一步检验了外包对就业以及产出的影响。检验结果表明,当企业把原本自制的但属于其它产业的中间投入品外包出去,将会提高企业的劳动生产率。原因是,外包产生了资本节约型的技术进步;外包在提高劳动生产率的同时,对就业并没有产生负面影响,原因是规模效应抵消了替代效应。正因为这两点,外包对产出的影响可以概括为两个方面:一是促进生产可能性前沿向外移动,是生产边界的推动器;二是导致生产结构从劳动密集型向资本密集型转变,是产品结构升级的转换器。     

Outsourcing, Foreign Ownership, and Productivity: Evidence from UK Establishment-level Data

The paper presents an empirical analysis of “outsourcing” using establishment‐level data for UK manufacturing industries. The authors analyze an establishment's decision to outsource and the subsequent effects of outsourcing on the establishment's productivity. Outsourcing is compared in domestic with foreign‐owned establishments. The empirical results suggest that high wages are positively related to outsourcing, suggesting that the cost‐saving motive is important. Foreign‐owned firms have higher levels of outsourcing than domestic establishments. In the productivity analysis, an establishment's outsourcing intensity is positively related to its labor productivity and total factor productivity growth, and this effect is more pronounced for foreign establishments.     

Structural change and misallocation: Firm‐level evidence from Poland*

Early transition literature linked a large number of firm failures with the inability to overcome the pre‐transition misallocation of resources, that is, the inadequate capital–labour ratio. We look at the link between misallocation and firm survival using a rich firm‐level dataset of over 1,600 manufacturing plants established in a centrally planned economy after 1945. Our duration models include the standard Olley–Pakes misallocation measures as well as a firm‐level measure of the counterfactual level of capital that takes into account the present‐day market allocation and productivity. We show that while privatization is positively related to firm survival, misallocation (a) was more of a firm‐level than sector‐level phenomenon and, more importantly, (b) it, in general, did not have a sizeable effect on the actual firm survival nor it had an impact on the outcome of privatization.     

Internet use and export upgrading: Firm‐level evidence from China

This paper explores the impact of widespread Internet use on the product choices of exporters. Based on a highly disaggregated firm–product‐level data matched from the Annual Survey of Industrial Firms and China Customs Transaction Database, our baseline empirical analysis suggests that (1) Internet use (i.e., having an official website or corporate email) affects both extensive margin and quality margin of exported products; (2) exporters using Internet propone to expand their product line of export by introducing new products (cost‐reduction effect on extensive margin); (3) the average quality of exported products becomes lower after the Internet is adopted by exporters (competition effect on quality margin). Our heterogeneous analysis further shows that (1) exporters with high productivity are immune to the negative impact of Internet use on quality margin and maintain quality growth; (2) having an official website exerts larger impacts on both extensive margin and quality margin compared with only having a corporate email system. Our research sheds light on the existing literature on Internet use and firm export behaviors.     

Export revenue and quality: Firm‐level evidence from developing countries

I combine firm‐level export data from eight low‐income and middle‐income countries to test the relation between export price and export revenue. Across‐firm estimations show a strong positive association between export price and export revenue. Within‐firm estimations show that firms generate larger export revenue from their high‐price products. The positive correlation between export price and export revenue is strong for manufactures, weak for primary commodities, and nonexistent for extractables. Results are robust to using an alternative quality measure and controlling for exporters’ market power.     

服务外包、生产率与就业：基于美国的实证

1．引言随着服务投入品国际外包的日益增加,美国是否应该促进保护法的实施以停止“就业的出口”成为了热门话题。例如,在2004年3月4日,美国国会通过联邦合同来实施对想把工作挪到国外的公司的限制。在本文,我们研究上述对外包会减少就业机会的这种担心是否有根据,并且估计外包是否会减少就业及外包是否会带来产出增加的弥补收益。     

Government Partisanship and Property Rights: Cross‐Country Firm‐Level Evidence

Property rights are essential to economic development but vary with the political environment. We develop and test the claim that government partisanship influences the security of business firms' property rights: the perceived security of property rights increases when right‐wing parties take power and declines with the election of left‐leaning parties. Unlike research that uses country‐level aggregates to draw inferences about the determinants of secure property rights, we analyze survey responses of over 7,400 firm owners from 73 countries using a novel difference‐in‐differences approach. We find that the political partisanship of the government in power strongly affects individual perceptions of property rights: firm owners are more likely to perceive that their property rights are secure under right‐leaning governments. Our results are robust to firm‐ and country‐level economic performance as well as controls for political institutions that might induce more stability to property rights, such as the number of checks and balances (veto players) in a system. Overall, our results indicate that business owners' beliefs about the security of property rights are highly responsive to changes in government partisanship.     

Exporting to fragile states in Africa: Firm‐level evidence

This study analyses the effect of fragility in destination markets on firm export behavior and the role of firm size in mediating adverse outcomes. The analysis is conducted using firm transaction data on Kenyan exports to Africa over the period 2004–2013. The analysis reveals that fragility negatively affects a firm's decision to enter a given destination market, reducing Kenya's bilateral trade flows to African countries. Larger firms are more resilient to destination shocks in fragility and are less likely to exit. These results are robust to alternative measures of destination fragility, and the exclusion of bordering countries and the East African Community partner states. Our analysis reveals that the effect of business fragility (regulatory quality, government effectiveness, and control of corruption) dominates that of political fragility (voice and accountability, rule of law, and political stability), although both effects are negative and significant.     

Partisan Cycles in Offshore Outsourcing: Evidence from U.S. Imports

The wage and employment effects of offshoring roil politics in the United States and around the world. Firms that offshore either outsource their activities to unaffiliated businesses, or internalize production by establishing subsidiaries from which they import intrafirm. We argue that the political environment in trade partner countries influences U.S. offshoring patterns in ways that have been ignored in the extant literature. Drawing on the political business cycle literature, we expect higher production costs and lower profits for firms in capital (labor) intensive sectors when the Left (Right) is in power. These partisan cycles, in turn, shape the sectoral composition of exports from the partner to the United States, and the degree to which trade is conducted intrafirm. Under a Left‐ (Right‐) leaning government in a partner country, U.S. intrafirm imports of capital‐ (labor‐) goods increase relative to total imports in these industries. Examining highly disaggregated U.S. import data, we find strong support for our argument. Our results indicate that the effect of partisan governments on offshore outsourcing depends on factor intensities of production, which vary across industries. The degree of internalization in global sourcing is shaped in part by the distributional objectives of partisan governments, and not by economic factors alone.     

Location decisions of non‐bank financial foreign direct investment: Firm‐level evidence from Europe

The non‐bank financial sector in Europe has more than doubled in size between 2005 and 2015 reflecting the substantial growth in shadow banking activities. However, a large proportion of the non‐bank financial sector that remains unmapped as granular balance sheet information is not available for over half of the sector. Motivated by these data gaps and employing firm‐level data, this paper examines the location decisions of newly incorporated foreign affiliates in the non‐bank financial sector across 27 European countries over the period 2004 to 2012. The probability of a country being chosen as the location for a new foreign affiliate is found to be negatively associated with higher corporate tax rates and geographic distance but increases with the size and financial development of the host country. The financial regulatory regime in the host country and gravity related controls such as the home and host country sharing a common legal system, language, border, and currency are also found to impact the likelihood of non‐bank financial FDI.     

ISO Standards: A Certificate to Expand Exports? Firm‐Level Evidence from Argentina

Does standard adoption help firms in developing countries overcome information barriers and thereby perform better in international markets? What are the channels through which certification affects firms' exports, the intensive margin, or the extensive margin? We provide evidence on the impact of certification on export performance using a unique firm‐level dataset for Argentina over the period 1998–2006. We find that ISO certification is associated with increased exports, along the extensive margin—primarily in terms of destination countries—and the intensive margin.     

Corporate Taxation and Productivity Catch‐Up: Evidence from European Firms

In this paper, we explore whether higher corporate tax rates, because they lower the after‐tax returns to productivity‐enhancing investments, reduce the speed with which small firms converge to the productivity frontier. Using data for 11 European countries, we find evidence that their productivity catch‐up is slower when the statutory corporate tax rates are higher. In contrast, we find that large firms are instead affected by effective marginal rates. Using the reduced‐form model of productivity convergence of Griffith et al . (2009, Journal of Regional Science 49 , 689–720), our results are robust to a host of robustness checks and a natural experiment that exploits the 2001 German tax reforms.     

Pricing to Firm: an Analysis of Firm‐ and Product‐level Import Prices*

We use Hungarian Customs data on product‐level imports of manufacturing firms to document that the import price of a particular product varies substantially across buying firms. We relate the level of import prices to firm characteristics such as size, foreign ownership, and market power. We develop a theory of “pricing to firm” (PTF), where markups depend on the technology and competitive environment of the buyer. The predictions of the model are confirmed by the data: import prices are higher for firms with greater market power, and for more essential intermediate inputs (with a high share in material costs). We take account of the endogeneity of the buyer’s market power with respect to higher import prices and unobserved cost heterogeneity within product categories. The magnitude of PTF is big: the standard deviation of price predicted by PTF is 21.5%.     

Monetary Transmission and Inventory: Evidence from Japanese Balance-Sheet Data by Firm Size

I analyse the response of inventories and short-term debts to monetary policy using disaggregated data on Japanese manufacturing firms classified by firm size. I find that monetary contraction decreases the inventories of large firms; however, inventories of small and medium firms increase considerably for the first several quarters. This implies that in a subcontracting system small and medium subcontractors serve as a buffer and alleviate the monetary shocks felt by their large parent firms. Moreover, inventory build-ups are financed by increases in accounts payable. I also find that for small firms land asset is important in easing credit conditions and increasing inventories.
JEL Classification Numbers: E22, E32, E44, E51.     

The Effect of Nominal Demand Shocks on Manufacturing Output: Evidence from Disaggregated Australian Data*

The menu costs model predicts that during times of rapid inflation firms are less likely to vary output in response to changes in nominal aggregate demand. This paper tests the proposition using a disaggregated sample of Australian three-digit ASIC manufacturing industries. The results show that a significant number of Australian industries exhibit behaviour that is consistent with this prediction. In addition, the results show that the variability of inflation and changes to the import penetration ratio also influence the response of output to nominal demand changes.