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Technology and Resilience

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Listed:
  • Comin, Diego
  • Cirera, Xavi
  • Cruz, Marcio
  • Lee, Kyung Min
  • Torres, Jesica

Abstract

This paper estimates the impact of technology sophistication pre-COVID-19 on the performance of firms during the early stages of the pandemic. We exploit a unique data covering firms from Brazil, Senegal, and Vietnam using a treatment effect mediation framework to decompose the results into a direct and an indirect effect. Increasing pre-pandemic technology sophistication by one standard deviation is associated with 3.8pp higher sales. Both effects are positive, but the direct effect is about 5 times larger than the indirect effect. The total effect on sales is markedly nonlinear with significantly smaller estimates of the reduction in sales for firms with more sophisticated pre-pandemic technology. Our results are robust to different measures of digital responses and matching estimators.

Suggested Citation

  • Comin, Diego & Cirera, Xavi & Cruz, Marcio & Lee, Kyung Min & Torres, Jesica, 2022. "Technology and Resilience," CEPR Discussion Papers 16885, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    • Handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:16885
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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • I15 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health and Economic Development
    • O12 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Microeconomic Analyses of Economic Development
    • O33 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes

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