Antidumping protection hurts exporters : firm-level evidence from France

Firms protected by antidumping measures do not unequivocally benefit from them. Antidumping protection benefits non-exporters active on the protected market by raising their domestic sales, but hurts exporters of similar products as the protected ones. Export sales of protected firms fall by almost 8% compared to a relevant control group of unprotected firms. This effect more than doubles for firms that are global, i.e. firms with foreign affiliates. Measured at the product-level, extra-EU exports of goods protected by antidumping fall by 36% while exports to target countries fall by as much as 66% following protection. Protection also has an effect on the extensive margin, by raising the probability to start exporting for firms that were initially nonexporters. Existing exporters face a higher probability to stop exporting during protection. Finally, we find that the productivity of exporters falls while that of non-exporters rises during antidumping protection. We offer a number of plausible explanations for our findings that stem from the heterogeneous firm literature. We also discuss the importance of our findings for policy.(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)