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Winners and Losers: Fragmentation, Trade and Wages Revisited

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Author Info

  • Geishecker, Ingo

    () (University of Göttingen)

  • Görg, Holger

    () (Kiel Institute for the World Economy)

Abstract

Our paper investigates the link between outsourcing and wages utilising a large household panel and combining it with industry level information on industries’ outsourcing activities from input-output tables. By doing so we can arguably overcome the potential endogeneity bias as well as other shortcomings that affect industry level studies. We find that fragmentation has had a marked impact on wages. Distinguishing three skill categories we find evidence that outsourcing reduced the real wage for workers in the lowest skill categories; this result is robust to a number of different specifications and definitions of outsourcing. Furthermore we find some evidence that high-skilled workers experienced increased wages due to fragmentation.

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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in its series IZA Discussion Papers with number 982.

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Length: 30 pages
Date of creation: Jan 2004
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp982

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Keywords: wages; fragmentation; trade; outsourcing; skills;

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References

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  1. Berman, E. & Bound, J. & Machin, S., 1997. "Implications of Skill-Biased Technological Change: International Evidence," Papers 25, Centre for Economic Performance & Institute of Economics.
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  16. Bernd Fitzenberger, 1999. "International Trade and the Skill Structure of Wages and Employment in West Germany," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), Justus-Liebig University Giessen, Department of Statistics and Economics, vol. 219(1+2), pages 67-89, July.
  17. Paul Krugman, 1995. "Growing World Trade: Causes and Consequences," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 26(1, 25th A), pages 327-377.
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  23. Falk, Martin & Koebel, Bertrand M, 2002. " Outsourcing, Imports and Labour Demand," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 104(4), pages 567-86, December.
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Citations

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Cited by:
  1. Michael Landesmann & Robert Stehrer, 2009. "South-North Integration, Outsourcing and Skills," wiiw Research Reports 353, The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw.
  2. Chiara BROCCOLINI & Alessia LO TURCO & Andrea PRESBITERO & Stefano STAFFOLANI, 2007. "International Outsourcing vs. ICT in explaining the wage gap in Italian Manufacturing," Working Papers 299, Universita' Politecnica delle Marche (I), Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche e Sociali.
  3. Ogloblin, C, 2004. "Global Outsourcing of Human Capital and the Incidence of Unemployment in the United States," Applied Econometrics and International Development, Euro-American Association of Economic Development, vol. 4(3).

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