This paper sets up a two country monopolistic competition model with intra-industry trade to study the effects of an exogenous differential in wage and social policies on the location of industry. Two model scenarios are considered. In the traditional one with physical capital, such a differential induces a relocation effect which increases with the level of trade integration. The 'new economic geography' world assumes mobile entrepreneurs which can relocate thus bringing agglomeration forces into play. The most significant difference between this world and the traditional one is that, at high levels of trade integration, where one country has emerged as the core and the other as the periphery, the core may have more generous social policies and higher wages than the periphery without inducing a relocation of firms. The scope to have higher wage is constrained, however, and related to the level of trade integration in a bell-shaped way.
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Paper provided by DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research in its series Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin with number
354.
Find related papers by JEL classification: F12 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Models of Trade with Imperfect Competition and Scale Economies F15 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Economic Integration F16 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade and Labor Market Interactions F21 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - International Investment; Long-Term Capital Movements F22 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - International Migration R12 - Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Size and Spatial Distributions of Regional Economic Activity; Interregional Trade (economic geography)
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