Export Activity,Firm Size and Wage Structure: Evidence from Taiwanese Manufacturing Firms*

This study adopts a semiparametric smooth coefficient model to evaluate the export–wage premiums, firm size–wage premiums, and the wage gap between skilled and unskilled labor. Particular focus is placed upon widespread evidence indicating that pay levels in ‘large’ and ‘export‐oriented’ firms are higher than in their ‘small’ and ‘domestic‐oriented’ counterparts. Applying the firm‐level data for Taiwanese manufacturing firms, we find a positive export–wage premium for skilled workers and a negative export–wage premium for unskilled workers. The hypothesis of a constant export premium across firm size is rejected. While most of the export–wage premiums for skilled labor can be attributed to the small and medium firms, the large exporting firms have a significant adverse effect on wages for unskilled labor. Moreover, our results suggest that the firm size–wage premiums for skilled workers are larger than those for unskilled workers. The wage gap between the two skill groups is also sensitive to size categories.     

The value-added tax reform and labor market outcomes: Firm-level evidence from China

The tax incentives designed to stimulate firm investment may have a large and unexpected impact on labor market outcomes. Using a comprehensive data set on Chinese manufacturing firms during the period 1998–2007 with a difference-in-differences approach, we examine the impact of the value-added tax reform in 2004 on the firm-level labor market outcomes. We find that firms in eligible industries and pilot regions (treated firms) enjoying lower costs of purchasing fixed assets under the reform tended to increase capital investment and reduce employment simultaneously relative to firms that did not have tax incentives (the control firms). Compared with the control firms, the treated firms became more capital intensive but had declines in labor share in value added and average wage. We also find that the employment adjustment is associated with increase in the share of skilled workers in terms of engineers and technicians, but not workers with a college degree or higher.     

Rigid wages or small equilibrium adjustments? Evidence from the contraction of 1893

Contrary to the conclusions drawn from some macroeconomic studies, U.S. labor markets could exhibit considerable cyclical wage rigidity even before World War I. Using disaggregated data from Cincinnati manufacturing firms during the 1893 contraction, I estimate a threshold or friction model of wage adjustment that distinguishes between impediments to wage cuts and wage cuts that were small but possibly market clearing. The wage adjustment process exhibited friction which was both statistically and economically significant and which varied with establishment size, capital intensity, and payment method. Worker resistance to wage cuts was a factor contributing to this pattern of wage rigidity.     

The minimum wage,exports, and firm performance: Evidence from Indonesia

This paper examines the interrelationship between changes in the provincial minimum wage, firms’ export behavior, and firms’ performance in Indonesia. In this regard, we apply a two-stage least squares regression analysis to detailed firm-level data of manufacturing enterprises during 2002–2014. We find that an increase in the minimum wage is associated with a decrease in a firm’s employment and productivity, but increase in its probability of exporting and markup. We also use the 2012 minimum wage reform in Indonesia to conduct a difference-in-difference analysis to further mitigate the potential endogeneity of minimum wage regulation. Our findings are generally robust to alternative estimation methods. Moreover, quantile regression results indicate that the average wage, firm size, and the education level of workers also affect the predictions. Above all, this study suggests that Indonesian exports and the country’s comparative advantage in international markets are not negligibly affected by higher labor costs caused by the growth in the minimum wage.     

Multinationals, skills, and wage elasticities

The increase in foreign direct investments raises concerns about labor market consequences in many countries. It is feared that multinational firms are inclined to shift jobs abroad and increase job volatility. We use firm-level data to examine if multinationality and foreign ownership affect the wage elasticity of labor demand. Unlike previous studies, we distinguish the effect on different skill groups of employees. We find no general difference in wage elasticity between foreign and domestic firms but the wage elasticity is higher in multinational firms than in national firms, in particular for medium-skilled workers.     

A model for China's industrial firms during the transitional period

Three interactive factors affecting the efficiency of firms and the demand for inputs underlie the firm model presented in this paper. They are the chronic shortage of key materials and energy, the immobility of capital and labor, and the endogeny of wage rate determination to firms. These assumptions are relatively more general and realistic for the Chinese economy than assumptions made in other firm models that may be suitable for market or Eastern European economies. By this model it can be shown that resource allocation within Chinese firms generally is not efficient and that the basic demand law for labor and capital is invalidated by immobility of factors and endogeny of wages. Overexpansion or a demand for inputs exceeding the amount necessary for efficient production is very probable.     

Employment and wage adjustments at firms under distress in Japan: An analysis based upon a survey

We use the result from a survey of Japanese firms in manufacturing and service to investigate the choice of wage and employment adjustments when they needed to reduce substantially the total labor cost. Our regression analysis indicates that the large size reduction favors the layoffs of the core employees, whereas the base wage cuts are more likely if the firms do not feel immediate pressures from the external labor market or the strong competition in the product market. We also find some evidence that the concerns over adverse selection or demoralizing effects of wage cuts are real. Firms do try to avoid using base wage cuts if they consider these factors more important.     

Do Exporting Firms Pay Higher Wages? Evidence from Kenya's Manufacturing Sector

Abstract: When trade liberalization was first embarked on in Kenya some 20 years ago, a key argument against it was that it would reduce domestic wages, as exporting firms sought to remain competitive versus, for example, the low‐cost Asian countries. A counter argument was that manufactured exports require more elaborate design, supervision, packaging and handling, and thus a more educated labor force than production for the domestic market. To attract such skills, exporting firms would need to pay higher wages than non‐exporting ones. This paper uses data from Kenyan manufacturing to study the impact of trade liberalization on earnings, distinguishing between exporting and non‐exporting firms. In particular, it investigates whether exporting firms paid a wage‐premium to their employees. The study uses manufacturing firm survey data from a World Bank regional project. The study has three important findings: (1) There was a large and significant effect of exporting on wages in the first decade of trade liberalization. During the first half of the 1990s, workers in exporting firms earned up to 30 percent more than those engaged in non‐exporting firms. The results are robust even after controlling for individual and firm‐level characteristics such as employee demographics, productivity, firm location and occupation. (2) After a decade of trade liberalization, exporting ceased to be a significant determinant of wages in Kenyan manufacturing, after controlling for productivity and firm location. (3) During the 2000s, casual or irregular employment became a more common feature of exporting firms. The results suggest that while higher wages were important in attracting skilled labor to exporting firms at the beginning of trade liberalization in the 1990s, domestic competition has since reduced the wage premium. Cost cutting pressures are instead reflected in the substitution of casual and low wage labor for permanent and better educated labor and in increased automation.     

Skilled-Labor Intensity Differences Across Firms,Endogenous Product Quality,and Wage Inequality

This paper proposes a theory to explain the relative wage-rate increase for skilled labor that results from trade liberalization that relies on within-sector reallocations of production resources (skilled and unskilled labor) across firms. Motivated by some stylized facts, in a model with firm heterogeneity, including firms that differ in their skill intensity even within a narrowly defined industry, firms with relatively high skill intensity that are more likely to be exporters, and a positive association between a firm’s skill intensity and its product quality, I develop a general equilibrium model where firms with a higher skill intensity endogenously choose a higher-quality product, and tend to be more profitable. In this framework, a reduction in trade costs allows members of the workforce to reallocate to more efficient firms that produce higher-quality products, using their skilled labor more intensively, resulting in a rising skill premium. The main sources of the increasing wage inequality that followed trade openness are a positive link between a firm’s skill intensity, its product quality, and quality competition.     

人口老龄化必然导致资本替代劳动吗

经济学理论认为,人口老龄化会导致劳动力成本上升,从而改变企业的要素结构、通过资本替代劳动的方式应对,但不同类型的企业对老龄化做出的反应可能存在差异,需要进行深入分析。文章利用中国工业企业数据对上述问题进行了研究,实证结果显示：整体来看,人口老龄化显著提高了企业的资本劳动比,但资本劳动比的上升并不一定表现为资本对劳动的替代。在规模较大、融资约束较轻的企业,老龄化促使其用固定资产投资替代了劳动,但在规模较小和融资约束程度较为严重的企业,人口老龄化并没有显著提高其固定资产投资,只是缩小了其劳动力雇佣规模,说明企业规模和融资约束是影响企业要素结构升级的重要因素。此外,文章还发现人口老龄化主要促使企业利用资本替代低技能劳动力,而人口老龄化的资本替代劳动效应在资本密集型、生产率水平较高和非出口企业中更为显著。文章从微观企业投资视角拓展了人口老龄化的经济效应的研究范畴,并通过规模效应和融资约束角度分析了制约工业企业提高智能化生产程度的因素,从而对传统的见解提供了有益的补充。文章的研究结论能够为政府制定积极应对人口老龄化和助力企业要素结构升级的相关政策提供经验证据的支持。     

外资所有权与工资升水——来自中国制造业的证据

很多研究发现外商投资企业比内资企业对同等情况下的工人所付工资要高,本文利用中国省际制造业分大类数据对此进行了实证研究,研究的结果表明,在控制了各种对工资影响因素(产业、地区、企业、工人素质)后,外资所有权工资升水显著存在,大约为10%。同时还对平均薪酬进行了研究,外资所有权薪酬升水大约为7%。此外,本文还得出了其他一些有意义的结论。     

Jobs with different wage determination mechanisms, social efficiency and unemployment

The purpose of this paper is to construct a theoretical framework for the labor market, which is composed of a variety of jobs with different wage determination mechanisms. We identify an equilibrium in which some firms post a wage and others bargain with workers. This paper shows that the proportion of firms adopting wage bargaining in a decentralized equilibrium is below the socially optimal level. We identify policies to increase this proportion and to improve social efficiency. Furthermore, we examine the impact of those policies on unemployment. The results of this study will determine the direction of employment policy on the labor market with various employment styles.     

Migrants and urban wage: Evidence from China's internal migration

Using China's 2005 1% population survey, this paper examines the wage impact on urban workers of rural to urban migration. We find that, on average, migrants increase the wages of urban workers, with the effect being magnified for more skilled urban workers. This suggests that migrants with skills similar to those of urban workers may complement them. We explore the possible channels of these effects. From the supply perspective, we find that migration inflows accelerate the occupational upgrading of urban workers, especially for low- and medium-skilled workers. From a demand perspective, as the share of migrants in the urban labor force increases, the number and output of industrial firms also increase, and firms become more reliant on low-skilled workers. The more migrants in a city, the greater the available employees for industrial firms, particularly for low-skilled employees. However, the effects on high-skilled firms are much smaller or insignificant. In addition, we find that migrants have little impact on firms' capital-labor and capital-output ratios. This suggests that firms can expand through capital adjustments to absorb inexpensive migrants, which alleviates the possible negative impact of migrants on the urban labor market.     

Firm specific human capital and unemployment in a growing economy

This study analyzes how the intensive use of firm specific human capital in firms affects the unemployment rate. For this purpose, I introduce into an equilibrium search model the possibility that workers quit their jobs. A worker changes his job when a firm that newly enters into the market offers a higher wage than his current wage. If firm specific human capital is important, it is difficult for a worker to quit his job, and, in consequence, the number of workers who quit their jobs is small. Thus, the unemployment rate is low. If the speed of technology obsolescence is high, the unemployment rate is high.     

最低工资制在完全与不完全市场中的影响——一个理论分析框架

本文通过构建一个包含产品市场和劳动力市场的模型,分析了最低工资制度在社会、经济等方面的影响,并得出以下结论:如果企业是市场工资率的被动接受者,则推行最低工资制度在促进劳动者福利提升的同时,会以减损社会总福利为代价,同时社会总产出水平下降;如果企业对市场工资率有影响能力,则通过最低工资制度提高就业者工资率水平,这不仅会促进劳动者福利的提升,同时也会造成社会总福利的改进,社会总产出水平上升。以此为基础,结合当前中国的社会实际,对于最低工资制度的实施提供了相关的政策建议。     

Unionization,market structure,and economic growth

This article investigates the macroeconomic effects of unionization in a Schumpeterian growth model with an endogenous product market structure and a unionized labor market. The endogeneity of the market structure and the trade unionism of the labor market interact and jointly determine the equilibrium unemployment, firm size, number of firms, economic growth, and distribution of income between workers and firms. We show that unionization governs the distribution of income between workers and firms and the unemployment rate, but it does not give rise to any growth effect on the economy. In addition, unionization discourages potential entrants and hence decreases the equilibrium number of firms. These results echo the empirical observation in the sense that unionization raises unemployment and alters the distribution of income between workers and firms, but it does not give rise to a significant, real impact on the firms’ investment and the economy‐wide growth.     

Labor remuneration in Jakarta''s small enterprises: Exploitative or equitable?

This paper examines labor remuneration in Jakarta's small-scale garment and wood furniture enterprises located in three industrial clusters. Workers in small-scale enterprises received an equitable wage in comparison with employment conditions in large firms and the minimum physical needs of workers. An equitable remuneration for workers is not so much dependent on enterprise size as the dynamics of the industrial sector. Therefore, government policies should focus on dynamic industrial sectors in specific contextual setting and location.     

Foreign direct investment, intellectual property rights, and wage inequality in China

This article incorporates foreign direct investment (FDI) and product differentiation in a general equilibrium trade model. The analysis shows that freer trade and FDI will upgrade China's technology, improve its skills of labor, and increase the competitiveness of local firms in the international market. At the same time, the relative wage of skilled labor to unskilled labor will rise. The size of this rise will be affected by the degree of protection for intellectual property rights. These theoretical results are consistent with empirical evidence. The analysis provides insights in coordinating policies on FDI, labor market reform, and intellectual property rights protection.     

Union—nonunion wage differentials over the business cycle: A bilateral monopoly model

Summary The primary purposes of this paper have been to provide a theoretical explanation of the declining ratio of union to nonunion wages during economic expansion and to identify the bargaining ranges associated with changing labor demand conditions and also associated with variation in the degree of union power relative to management.By modifying the Marshall-Cartter bilateral monopoly model to permit firm wage preferences to be consistent with the assumption of profit maximization, the feasible negotiation ranges were identified. Depending upon the degree of relative union power, the nature of the union labor supply and MRC functions were found to vary, resulting in variation in the firm's optimum feasible wage-employment combinations. Generally, the more imbalanced the relative power ratio, the smaller will be the size of the bargaining range. Also, the more imperfect the union's information concerning the firm's demand for labor function, the larger the bargaining range.Because of the discontinuity in the firm's marginal resource cost function, a large rise in the marginal revenue product of labor may be required, for unionized firms compared with nonunion firms, before the firm will seek additional employment at the expense of rising wages. However, as expansion continues, the consequent narrowing of the union-nonunion differential will cease and may be partially reversed as a lagged wage patterning response by union firms occurs. Because the discontinuity is not an influence on wage determination during the recession phase, the increase in the union-nonunion wage ration during recession will be less than the decrease resulting from an expansion of equal strength.     

Firms’ demand for work hours: Evidence from matched firm-worker data in Japan

Using information on Japanese males’ work hours and the matched firms’ characteristics, this paper investigates whether the number of hours worked is determined by demand-side factors and tries to offer a possible explanation of why Japanese males tend to work longer on average, than their counterparts in other countries. Based on an empirical framework in which each firm sets a minimum boundary of work hours and where workers hired by the firm are required to put in at least the minimum hours, we found that the minimum requirement depends on each firm’s fixed costs of labor. Specifically, firms that tend to hoard labor during recessions, presumably because of higher fixed costs, require incumbent workers to work longer hours during normal times. Since Japanese firms have long been considered as incurring high fixed costs to train workers, we interpret the long work hour requirement as a rational strategy for Japanese firms in protecting high-skill-accumulated workers from dismissal. In other words, the long work hours of Japanese males reflect firms’ long-term employment practices, a typical feature of the Japanese labor market.