IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cen/wpaper/18-43.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

A Portrait of U.S. Factoryless Goods Producers

Author

Listed:
  • Fariha Kamal

Abstract

This paper evaluates the U.S. Census Bureau’s most recent data collection efforts to classify business entities that engage in an extreme form of production fragmentation called “factoryless” goods production. “Factoryless” goods-producing entities outsource physical transformation activities while retaining ownership of the intellectual property and control of sales to customers. Responses to a special inquiry on the incidence of purchases of contract manufacturing services in combination with data on production inputs and outputs, intellectual property, and international trade is used to identify and document characteristics of “factoryless” firms in the U.S. economy.

Suggested Citation

  • Fariha Kamal, 2018. "A Portrait of U.S. Factoryless Goods Producers," Working Papers 18-43, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    • Handle: RePEc:cen:wpaper:18-43
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www2.census.gov/ces/wp/2018/CES-WP-18-43.pdf
    File Function: First version, 2018
    Download Restriction: no

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Teresa C. Fort & Justin R. Pierce & Peter K. Schott, 2018. "New Perspectives on the Decline of US Manufacturing Employment," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 32(2), pages 47-72, Spring.
    2. John Haltiwanger & Ron S. Jarmin & Robert Kulick & Javier Miranda, 2016. "High Growth Young Firms: Contribution to Job, Output, and Productivity Growth," NBER Chapters, in: Measuring Entrepreneurial Businesses: Current Knowledge and Challenges, pages 11-62, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Robert C. Feenstra & Shang-Jin Wei, 2010. "China's Growing Role in World Trade," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number feen07-1, June.
    4. Andrew B. Bernard & Teresa C. Fort, 2013. "Factoryless Goods Producers in the US," Working Papers 13-46, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    5. Autor, David & Dorn, David & Katz, Lawrence F. & Patterson, Christina & Van Reenen, John, 2017. "The fall of the Labor share and the rise of superstar firms," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 83616, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    6. Teresa C. Fort, 2017. "Technology and Production Fragmentation: Domestic versus Foreign Sourcing," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 84(2), pages 650-687.
    7. Mion, Giordano & Zhu, Linke, 2013. "Import competition from and offshoring to China: A curse or blessing for firms?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(1), pages 202-215.
    8. Bernard, Andrew B. & Jensen, J. Bradford & Schott, Peter K., 2006. "Survival of the best fit: Exposure to low-wage countries and the (uneven) growth of U.S. manufacturing plants," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(1), pages 219-237, January.
    9. Feenstra, Robert C. & Wei, Shang-Jin (ed.), 2010. "China's Growing Role in World Trade," National Bureau of Economic Research Books, University of Chicago Press, number 9780226239712, March.
    10. Fariha Kamal & Brent R. Moulton & Jennifer Ribarsky, 2013. "Measuring “Factoryless” Manufacturing: Evidence From U.S. Surveys," Working Papers 13-44, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    11. Justin R. Pierce & Peter K. Schott, 2016. "The Surprisingly Swift Decline of US Manufacturing Employment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(7), pages 1632-1662, July.
    12. Julia I. Lane & John C. Haltiwanger & James Spletzer, 1999. "Productivity Differences across Employers: The Roles of Employer Size, Age, and Human Capital," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(2), pages 94-98, May.
    13. Johnson, Robert C. & Noguera, Guillermo, 2012. "Accounting for intermediates: Production sharing and trade in value added," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(2), pages 224-236.
    14. Ron S Jarmin & Javier Miranda, 2002. "The Longitudinal Business Database," Working Papers 02-17, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Teresa C. Fort, 2019. "Comment on "A Portrait of U.S. Factoryless Goods Producers"," NBER Chapters, in: The Challenges of Globalization in the Measurement of National Accounts, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Diane Coyle & David Nguyen, 2019. "No plant, no problem? Factoryless manufacturing and economic measurement," Economic Statistics Centre of Excellence (ESCoE) Discussion Papers ESCoE DP-2019-15, Economic Statistics Centre of Excellence (ESCoE).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kamal, Fariha & Lovely, Mary E., 2017. "Import competition from and offshoring to low-income countries: Implications for employment and wages at U.S. domestic manufacturers," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 100-119.
    2. Teresa C. Fort & Justin R. Pierce & Peter K. Schott, 2018. "New Perspectives on the Decline of US Manufacturing Employment," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 32(2), pages 47-72, Spring.
    3. Amador, João & Cabral, Sónia, 2014. "Global value chains: surveying drivers and measures," Working Paper Series 1739, European Central Bank.
    4. Alon, Titan & Berger, David & Dent, Robert & Pugsley, Benjamin, 2018. "Older and slower: The startup deficit’s lasting effects on aggregate productivity growth," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 68-85.
    5. Feenstra, Robert C. & Ma, Hong & Xu, Yuan, 2019. "US exports and employment," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 46-58.
    6. David Hummels & Jakob R. Munch & Chong Xiang, 2018. "Offshoring and Labor Markets," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 56(3), pages 981-1028, September.
    7. Pol Antràs, 2020. "De-Globalisation? Global Value Chains in the Post-COVID-19 Age," NBER Working Papers 28115, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Pritish K. Sahu, 2016. "Malaysia's Domestic Value Added Export: The Role of Governance and Strategic Policy Reforms," International Journal of Economics and Financial Issues, Econjournals, vol. 6(4), pages 1578-1584.
    9. McManus, T. Clay & Schaur, Georg, 2016. "The effects of import competition on worker health," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 160-172.
    10. Nicholas Bloom & Andre Kurmann & Kyle Handley & Philip Luck, 2019. "The Impact of Chinese Trade on U.S. Employment: The Good, The Bad, and The Apocryphal," 2019 Meeting Papers 1433, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    11. Sofia Torreggiani & Antonio Andreoni, 2019. "Dancing with dragons: Chinese import penetration and the performances of manufacturing firms in South Africa," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2019-63, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    12. Muendler, Marc-Andreas, 2017. "Trade, technology, and prosperity: An account of evidence from a labor-market perspective," WTO Staff Working Papers ERSD-2017-15, World Trade Organization (WTO), Economic Research and Statistics Division.
    13. Matthias Flückiger & Markus Ludwig, 2015. "Chinese export competition, declining exports and adjustments at the industry and regional level in Europe," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 48(3), pages 1120-1151, August.
    14. Nathan Goldschlag & Javier Miranda, 2020. "Business dynamics statistics of High Tech industries," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(1), pages 3-30, January.
    15. Pierce, Justin R. & Schott, Peter K., 2018. "Investment responses to trade liberalization: Evidence from U.S. industries and establishments," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 203-222.
    16. José de Sousa & Laura Hering & Sandra Poncet, 2015. "Has trade openness reduced pollution in China?," Working Papers 2015-11, CEPII research center.
    17. Andrew N. Greenland & Mihai Ion & John W. Lopresti & Peter K. Schott, 2020. "Using Equity Market Reactions to Infer Exposure to Trade Liberalization," NBER Working Papers 27510, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    18. Ryan A. Decker & John C. Haltiwanger & Ron S. Jarmin & Javier Miranda, 2018. "Changing Business Dynamism and Productivity: Shocks vs. Responsiveness," NBER Working Papers 24236, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. Carmine Ornaghi & Ilke Van Beveren & Stijn vanormelingen,, 2017. "The impact of service and goods offshoring on employment : Firm-level evidence," Working Paper Research 319, National Bank of Belgium.
    20. João Amador & Sónia Cabral, 2014. "Global Value Chains: Surveying Drivers, Measures and Impacts," Working Papers w201403, Banco de Portugal, Economics and Research Department.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    contract manufacturing services; “factoryless” production; imports; multinationals; intellectual property;

    JEL classification:

    • F1 - International Economics - - Trade
    • F14 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Empirical Studies of Trade
    • F23 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - Multinational Firms; International Business
    • F6 - International Economics - - Economic Impacts of Globalization
    • L23 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Organization of Production

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:cen:wpaper:18-43. 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: (Dawn Anderson). General contact details of provider: http://edirc.repec.org/data/cesgvus.html .

    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.