Stay updated with breaking news from Import Competition. Get real-time updates on events, politics, business, and more. Visit us for reliable news and exclusive interviews.
The consensus view until the 2010s was that trade had little impact on inequality in high-income countries. This column reviews the recent evidence that challenges this view. Manufacturing employment contracted sharply in countries like the US and the UK which faced rapid net import growth from China. The resulting, persistent adverse effects on employment and incomes of
Do credit supply shocks affect employment in middle-income countries? Image Small and medium-size firms (SMEs) have been a subject of great interest to scholars and policy makers, as these enterprises play a critical role in the provision of employment around the globe (Ayyagari et al. 2011). However, the ability of SMEs to create jobs is hampered by their limited access to adequate finance, particularly in low- and middle-income economies (LMIEs) in which credit constraints are severe et al. 2003; Ayyagari et al. 2011; Stein et al. 2010). Having lower saving rates, weaker investor protection...
Takashi Oshio, Seiichi Inagaki While globalisation has enabled both the growth of poorer countries and access to cheaper consumer goods in richer ones, many worry that the effects of trade – and particularly import competition – have been poorly distributed across individuals in developed countries. At the core of an important literature (Autor et al. 2013a, 2014, 2016, Ebenstein et al. 2014, Pierce and Schott 2016), the ‘China shock’ has been shown to lead locally to higher unemployment, lower labour force participation and reduced wages. Spatial heterogeneity of the local labour m...