IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/swe/wpaper/2012-07.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Efficiency and Outsourcing: Evidence from Australian Manufacturing

Author

Listed:
  • Sasan Bakhtiari

    (School of Economics, The University of New South Wales)

Abstract

This paper studies the role of efficiency in a firm’s decision to contract out. Emphasis is on the heterogeneous nature of firms and when firms are only considering outsourcing to domestic suppliers. Firm-level data on Australian manufacturing reveal an ordering of efficiency between firms that contract out and those that do not, in which contracting-out firms are on aggregate less efficient. The analysis further shows that firms experience improvement in their efficiency soon after contracting out, but only if their performance has been below average prior to contracting out. The results show robustness to the choice of efficiency measure, where efficiency is expressed in both productivity and cost advantage.

Suggested Citation

  • Sasan Bakhtiari, 2011. "Efficiency and Outsourcing: Evidence from Australian Manufacturing," Discussion Papers 2012-07, School of Economics, The University of New South Wales.
    • Handle: RePEc:swe:wpaper:2012-07
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://research.economics.unsw.edu.au/RePEc/papers/2012-07.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Wilhelm Kohler & Marcel Smolka, 2009. "Global Sourcing Decisions and Firm Productivity: Evidence from Spain," CESifo Working Paper Series 2903, CESifo.
    2. Pol Antràs, 2005. "Incomplete Contracts and the Product Cycle," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(4), pages 1054-1073, September.
    3. Arindrajit Dube & Ethan Kaplan, 2010. "Does Outsourcing Reduce Wages in the Low-Wage Service Occupations? Evidence from Janitors and Guards," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 63(2), pages 287-306, January.
    4. Daron Acemoglu & Philippe Aghion & Fabrizio Zilibotti, 2003. "Vertical Integration and Distance to Frontier," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 1(2-3), pages 630-638, 04/05.
    5. Grossman, Sanford J & Hart, Oliver D, 1986. "The Costs and Benefits of Ownership: A Theory of Vertical and Lateral Integration," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 94(4), pages 691-719, August.
    6. Abraham, Katharine G & Taylor, Susan K, 1996. "Firms' Use of Outside Contractors: Theory and Evidence," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 14(3), pages 394-424, July.
    7. José C. Fariñas & Ana Martín‐Marcos, 2010. "Foreign Sourcing and Productivity: Evidence at the Firm Level," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(3), pages 482-506, March.
    8. Stefano Federico, 2010. "Outsourcing versus Integration at Home or Abroad," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 742, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    9. Tomiura, Eiichi, 2007. "Foreign outsourcing, exporting, and FDI: A productivity comparison at the firm level," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 72(1), pages 113-127, May.
    10. Robert Breunig & Marn‐Heong Wong, 2008. "A Richer Understanding of Australia's Productivity Performance in the 1990s: Improved Estimates Based Upon Firm‐Level Panel Data," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 84(265), pages 157-176, June.
    11. Stefano Federico, 2010. "Outsourcing versus integration at home or abroad and firm heterogeneity," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 37(1), pages 47-63, February.
    12. Gene M. Grossman & Elhanan Helpman, 2002. "Integration versus Outsourcing in Industry Equilibrium," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 117(1), pages 85-120.
    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. Sasan Bakhtiari, 2011. "Size Evolution and Outsourcing: Theory and Evidence from Australian Manufacturing," Discussion Papers 2012-08, School of Economics, The University of New South Wales.

    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. Sasan Bakhtiari, 2015. "Productivity, outsourcing and exit: the case of Australian manufacturing," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 44(2), pages 425-447, February.
    2. Sasan Bakhtiari, 2013. "Firm Size Evolution and Outsourcing," Discussion Papers 2013-07, School of Economics, The University of New South Wales.
    3. Sasan Bakhtiari, 2011. "Size Evolution and Outsourcing: Theory and Evidence from Australian Manufacturing," Discussion Papers 2012-08, School of Economics, The University of New South Wales.
    4. Schwarz, Christian & Suedekum, Jens, 2014. "Global sourcing of complex production processes," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(1), pages 123-139.
    5. Valeria Gattai & Valentina Trovato, 2014. "Estimating sourcing premia with Italian regional data," Working Papers 276, University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Economics, revised Jun 2014.
    6. Kohler, Wilhelm & Smolka, Marcel, 2014. "Global sourcing and firm selection," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 124(3), pages 411-415.
    7. Defever, Fabrice & Toubal, Farid, 2013. "Productivity, relationship-specific inputs and the sourcing modes of multinationals," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 345-357.
    8. Verena Nowak & Christian Schwarz & Jens Suedekum, 2012. "On the Organizational Structure of Multinational Firms - Which Sourcing Mode for which Input?," CESifo Working Paper Series 3823, CESifo.
    9. Christensen, Jonas Gade, 2011. "Productivity, Size, and the Disintegration of Industrial Production," Working Papers in Economics 07/11, University of Bergen, Department of Economics.
    10. Pietro De Ponti & Valeria Gattai, 2022. "Family Firms and Input Procurement: Firm-Level Evidence from Italy," Working Papers 499, University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Economics, revised Jun 2022.
    11. Aekapol Chongvilaivan & Jung Hur, 2012. "Trade Openness and Vertical Integration: Evidence from the U.S. Manufacturing Sector," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 78(4), pages 1242-1264, April.
    12. Fabio Pieri & Enrico Zaninotto, 2013. "Vertical integration and efficiency: an application to the Italian machine tool industry," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 40(2), pages 397-416, February.
    13. Gattai Valeria & Trovato Valentina, 2016. "Estimating Sourcing Premia Using Italian Regional Data," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 16(2), pages 1029-1067, April.
    14. Dermot Leahy & Catia Montagna, 2008. "Outsourcing Versus Fdi In Oligopoly Equilibrium," Dundee Discussion Papers in Economics 215, Economic Studies, University of Dundee.
    15. Gregory Corcos & Delphine M. Irac & Giordano Mion & Thierry Verdier, 2013. "The Determinants of Intrafirm Trade: Evidence from French Firms," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 95(3), pages 825-838, July.
    16. Wilhelm Kohler & Marcel Smolka, 2015. "Global Sourcing of Heterogeneous Firms: Theory and Evidence," CESifo Working Paper Series 5184, CESifo.
    17. Marta Bernasconi & Sara Galetti & Valeria Gattai & Piergiovanna Natale, 2022. "Contract Incompleteness and the Boundaries of the Firm in Times of COVID-19," Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, Springer, vol. 22(3), pages 371-409, December.
    18. Che, XiaoGang & Yang, Yibai & Zhang, Haoyu, 2010. "Outsourcing and R&D Investment with Costly Patent Protection," MPRA Paper 25516, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    19. Peter Eppinger & Hong Ma, 2023. "Optimal Ownership and Firm Performance: An Analysis of China’s FDI Liberalization," CESifo Working Paper Series 10551, CESifo.
    20. Angels Pelegrín & José García-Quevedo, 2012. "Which firms are involved in foreign vertical integration?," Working Papers 2012/38, Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Outsourcing; Productivity; Cost Advantage; Manufacturing.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D24 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Production; Cost; Capital; Capital, Total Factor, and Multifactor Productivity; Capacity
    • L21 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Business Objectives of the Firm
    • L24 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Contracting Out; Joint Ventures
    • L6 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Manufacturing

    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:swe:wpaper:2012-07. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    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 bibliographic 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.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Hongyi Li (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/senswau.html .

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.