American Economic Review Vol. 102 No. 7 2012

Exports, Export Destinations, and Skills

Irene Brambilla¹; Daniel Lederman²; Guido Porto³

¹ Universidad Nacional de La Plata and CONICET, Calle 6 e/ 47 y 48, Departamento de Economia, FCE-UNLP, 1900 La Plata, Argentina. · ² The World Bank, 1818 H St. NW, Washington, DC 20433. · ³ Universidad Nacional de La Plata, Calle 6 e/ 47 y 48, Departamento de Economia, FCE-UNLP, 1900 La Plata, Argentina.

Abstract

This paper explores the links between exports, export destinations, and skill utilization. We identify two mechanisms behind these links: differences across destinations in quality valuation and in exporting required services, activities that are intensive in skilled labor. Depending on the characteristics of the source country (income, language), the theories suggest a skill-bias in export destinations. We test the theory using a panel of Argentine manufacturing firms. We find that Argentine firms exporting to high-income countries hired more skilled workers than other exporters and domestic firms. Instead, we cannot identify any causal effect of exporting per se on skill utilization.

DOI

10.1257/aer.102.7.3406

Volume

102

Issue

7

Pages

3406-3438

Language

en

Sources

bibtex:phds-export.bib openalex crossref

Cite

APA 7 MLA 9 Chicago (author–date) Harvard Elsevier Harvard (JFE, JBF…) The Accounting Review Academy of Management American Marketing Association INFORMS (Management Science) Copy citation Copied ✓