IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/
MyIDEAS: Log in (now much improved!) to save this paper

Trade in services : IT and task content

Author Info

Listed author(s):
  • Andrea Ariu

    ()

    (Université catholique de Louvain, IRES
    Université catholique de Louvain, CORE
    University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Economics (FELU), Slovenia)

  • Giordano Mion

    ()

    (London School of Economics, Department of Geography and Environment
    Author-Workplace-Name: National Bank of Belgium, Research Department
    CEP, UK
    CEPR, UK)

Abstract

In this paper we investigate the determinants of the dramatic increase in services tradability focusing on the extensive margin of the phenomenon. We use balance sheet and firm-level service trade information over the period 1995-2005 provided by the National Bank of Belgium and we merge it with information on the evolution of information technology use and tasks performed by workers from the qualification and career survey provided by the BIBB-IAB. We show that technological change, measured either by the more intensive use of information technologies or by changes in the task content of jobs, has substantially contributed to the increase in the number of service-trading firms. Interestingly, we find evidence of a churning effect. While technological change has induced net entry into service trading, it has also increased the likelihood of both gross entry and exit of firms. Furthermore, our evidence suggests that due to the peculiar nature of services provision, the change in the tasks content of jobs is a better measure of technological change than the use of information technologies. Our results are robust to controlling for service trade liberalization and offshoring.

Download Info

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.

File URL: https://www.nbb.be/doc/oc/repec/reswpp/wp200en.pdf
Download Restriction: no

Paper provided by National Bank of Belgium in its series Working Paper Research with number 200.

as
in new window

Length: 56 pages
Date of creation: Oct 2010
Handle: RePEc:nbb:reswpp:201010-200
Contact details of provider: Postal:
Boulevard de Berlaimont 14, B-1000 Bruxelles

Phone: (+ 32) (0) 2 221 25 34
Fax: (+ 32) (0) 2 221 31 62
Web page: https://www.nbb.be/
Email:


More information through EDIRC

Keywords: trade in services; extensive margin; technological change; task content;

Find related papers by JEL classification:

  • F14 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Empirical Studies of Trade
  • F16 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade and Labor Market Interactions
  • O33 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes
  • L80 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Services - - - General

This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:

as
in new window


  1. Alexandra Spitz-Oener, 2006. "Technical Change, Job Tasks, and Rising Educational Demands: Looking outside the Wage Structure," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 24(2), pages 235-270, April.
  2. Joseph Francois & Bernard Hoekman, 2010. "Services Trade and Policy," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 48(3), pages 642-692, September.
  3. Levy, Frank & Murnane, Richard J, 1996. "With What Skills Are Computers a Complement?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(2), pages 258-262, May.
  4. Becker, Sascha O. & Ekholm, Karolina & Muendler, Marc-Andreas, 2013. "Offshoring and the onshore composition of tasks and skills," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(1), pages 91-106.
  5. Caroline Freund & Diana Weinhold, 2002. "The Internet and International Trade in Services," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(2), pages 236-240, May.
  6. David H. Autor & Frank Levy & Richard J. Murnane, 2003. "The skill content of recent technological change: an empirical exploration," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, issue Nov.
  7. Heckman, James, 2013. "Sample selection bias as a specification error," Applied Econometrics, Publishing House "SINERGIA PRESS", vol. 31(3), pages 129-137.
  8. Bernard Hoekman, 2008. "The General Agreement on Trade in Services: Doomed to Fail? Does it Matter?," Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, Springer, vol. 8(3), pages 295-318, December.
  9. Gene M. Grossman & Esteban Rossi-Hansberg, 2008. "Trading Tasks: A Simple Theory of Offshoring," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(5), pages 1978-1997, December.
Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

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

as
in new window


Cited by:

  1. Stefano Federico & Enrico Tosti, 2012. "Exporters and importers of services: firm-level evidence on Italy," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 877, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
  2. Baldwin, Richard, 2011. "21st century regionalism: Filling the gap between 21st century trade and 20th century trade rules," WTO Staff Working Papers ERSD-2011-08, World Trade Organization (WTO), Economic Research and Statistics Division.
  3. Baldwin, Richard, 2010. "Unilateral tariff liberalisation," CEPR Discussion Papers 8162, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  4. Yvonne Wolfmayr & Elisabeth Christen & Michael Pfaffermayr, 2013. "Pattern, Determinants and Dynamics of Austrian Service Exports – A Firmlevel Analysis," FIW Research Reports series IV-005, FIW.
  5. Martin Borowiecki & Bernhard Dachs & Doris Hanzl-Weiss & Steffen Kinkel & Johannes Pöschl & Magdolna Sass & Thomas Christian Schmall & Robert Stehrer & Andrea Szalavetz, 2012. "Global Value Chains and the EU Industry," wiiw Research Reports 383, The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw.
  6. E. Dhyne & L. Dresse & C. Fuss & Ch. Piette, 2011. "Behaviour of Belgian firms in the context of globalisation : lessons from the conference on “International Trade : Threats and Opportunities in a Globalised World”," Economic Review, National Bank of Belgium, issue i, pages 73-88, June.
  7. Emanuele Forlani, 2012. "Competition in Services and Efficiency of Manufacturing Firms:Does “Liberalization” Matter?," LICOS Discussion Papers 31112, LICOS - Centre for Institutions and Economic Performance, KU Leuven.

This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

Access and download statistics

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nbb:reswpp:201010-200. 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: ()

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 references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link 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 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.

This information is provided to you by IDEAS at the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis using RePEc data.