In this paper, we adopt the vertical differentiation duopoly framework to give a full description of firms’ relocation decisions, when the removal either of trade barriers or of restrictions on capital outflows/inflows (‘globalization’) allows them to serve the domestic market through foreign plants. We identify the advantages associated with production abroad with the possibility of exploiting a given wage differential. We show that when the liberalization of trade or investment flows yields the relocation of the whole industry, autarchy is strictly better, in welfare terms, than ‘globalization’. It is only when relocation is a dominant strategy for one (and only one) of the firms, that ‘globalization’ may be unambiguously welfare improving. Furthermore, we show that the effects of the relocation of the high or of the low quality firm are different. In particular, if the economy is ‘high quality biased’ (‘low quality biased’) the relocation of the firm producing the high quality variant (the low quality variant) is preferred, in welfare terms, to the relocation of the other firm, if the wage differential is high enough.
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version under "Related research" (further below) or search for a different version of it.
Publisher Info
Paper provided by C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers in its series CEPR Discussion Papers with number
1863.
Find related papers by JEL classification: F02 - International Economics - - General - - - International Economic Order; Noneconomic International Organizations;; Economic Integration and Globalization: General F12 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Models of Trade with Imperfect Competition and Scale Economies F23 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - Multinational Firms; International Business J60 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, and Vacancies - - - General L13 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Oligopoly and Other Imperfect Markets
Cited by: (explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)