IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/car/carecp/11-07.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Unemployment and Welfare Consequences of International Outsourcing under Monopolistic Competition

Author

Abstract

This paper challenges the conventional academic view that international outsourcing is just another form of gainful trade. Contrary to this view, we show that labor-service outsourcing can reduce the high-wage country's welfare even when product-market trade is beneficial, within a model that combines involuntary unemployment and monopolistic competition. Outsourcing's impact on welfare is worsened by a definite loss of jobs and a possible contraction in the range of varieties produced worldwide. While owners of capital benefit from outsourcing under certain conditions, labor's welfare always falls.

Suggested Citation

  • Richard A. Brecher & Zhiqi Chen, 2011. "Unemployment and Welfare Consequences of International Outsourcing under Monopolistic Competition," Carleton Economic Papers 11-07, Carleton University, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:car:carecp:11-07
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.carleton.ca/economics/wp-content/uploads/cep11-07.pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Michael Spence, 1976. "Product Selection, Fixed Costs, and Monopolistic Competition," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 43(2), pages 217-235.
    2. Hartmut Egger & Udo Kreickemeier, 2017. "International Fragmentation: Boon or Bane for Domestic Employment?," World Scientific Book Chapters,in: International Trade and Labor Markets Welfare, Inequality and Unemployment, chapter 9, pages 237-263 World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    3. Mitra, Devashish & Ranjan, Priya, 2007. "Offshoring and Unemployment," IZA Discussion Papers 2805, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
    4. Richard A. Brecher & Zhiqi Chen, 2010. "Unemployment of Skilled and Unskilled Labor in an Open Economy: International Trade, Migration, and Outsourcing," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 18(5), pages 990-1000, November.
    5. Jagdish Bhagwati & Arvind Panagariya, 2004. "The Muddles over Outsourcing," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 18(4), pages 93-114, Fall.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Outsourcing; Offshoring; Unemployment; Welfare; Variety;

    JEL classification:

    • F12 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Models of Trade with Imperfect Competition and Scale Economies; Fragmentation
    • F16 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade and Labor Market Interactions
    • F20 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:car:carecp:11-07. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Sabrina Robineau). General contact details of provider: .

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.