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Relocation and Investment in R&D by Firms

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  • Bárcena Ruiz, Juan Carlos
  • Garzón San Felipe, María Begoña

Abstract

The literature on foreign direct investment has analyzed firms’ location decisions when they invest in R&D to reduce production costs. Such firms may set up new plants in other developed countries while maintaining their domestic plants. In contrast, here we consider firms that close down their domestic operations and relocate to countries where wage costs are lower. Thus, we assume that firms may reduce their production costs by investing in R&D and also by moving their plants abroad. We show that these two mechanisms are complementary. When a firm relocates it invests more in R&D than when it does not change its location and, therefore, its production cost is lower in the first case. As a result, investment in R&D encourages firms to relocate. When firms do not invest in R&D on relocation, R&D discourages firms to relocate since the investment made by the firms that remain in the country partially offsets the labor cost advantage obtained by the firms that move their plants abroad.

Suggested Citation

  • Bárcena Ruiz, Juan Carlos & Garzón San Felipe, María Begoña, 2011. "Relocation and Investment in R&D by Firms," IKERLANAK info:eu-repo/grantAgreeme, Universidad del País Vasco - Departamento de Fundamentos del Análisis Económico I.
  • Handle: RePEc:ehu:ikerla:6234
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    relocation; R&D; trade unions; social welfare; imperfect competition;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D6 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics
    • F16 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade and Labor Market Interactions
    • J51 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor-Management Relations, Trade Unions, and Collective Bargaining - - - Trade Unions: Objectives, Structure, and Effects
    • L13 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Oligopoly and Other Imperfect Markets

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