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Global Engagement and the Occupational Structure of Firms

Davidson, Carl ; Heyman, Fredrik LU ; Matusz, Steven ; Sjöholm, Fredrik LU and Chun Zhu, Susan (2014) In Working Paper / Department of Economics, School of Economics and Management, Lund University 22.
Abstract
Engagement in foreign markets can have an impact on firm organization and on the type of occupations that a firm needs. We examine the effect of globalization on the occupational mix using detailed Swedish data that cover all firms and a representative sample of the labor force for 1997-2005. We find a robust relationship between a firm’s degree of international integration and its occupational mix. Multinationals, which are the most globally engaged firms, have a distribution of occupations skewed toward the more skilled. Non-multinational exporters have a distribution of occupations less skewed toward skilled compared to multinationals, but more skewed toward skilled occupations compared to Swedish non-exporters (which are the least... (More)
Engagement in foreign markets can have an impact on firm organization and on the type of occupations that a firm needs. We examine the effect of globalization on the occupational mix using detailed Swedish data that cover all firms and a representative sample of the labor force for 1997-2005. We find a robust relationship between a firm’s degree of international integration and its occupational mix. Multinationals, which are the most globally engaged firms, have a distribution of occupations skewed toward the more skilled. Non-multinational exporters have a distribution of occupations less skewed toward skilled compared to multinationals, but more skewed toward skilled occupations compared to Swedish non-exporters (which are the least globally engaged). Moreover, firms tend to have an even more skill intensive distribution of occupations when they mainly export to far away markets, or when they export differentiated goods. Our results are little changed (1) when we control for firm size, productivity, capital intensity, and firm age, (2) when we control for offshoring and R&D expenditures; (3) when we use alternative methods to rank occupations, or (4) when we conduct alternative robustness tests. In addition, the results are very similar for manufacturing and non-manufacturing, and for foreign and Swedish multinationals. We interpret our results using a decomposition motivated by recent theoretical models of selection into exporting and FDI. (Less)
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author
; ; ; and
organization
publishing date
type
Working paper/Preprint
publication status
published
subject
keywords
Occupational mix, Globalization, Multinational Enterprises, Export, Firms
in
Working Paper / Department of Economics, School of Economics and Management, Lund University
volume
22
pages
58 pages
publisher
Department of Economics, Lund University
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
36fe1d59-5a74-471e-a140-3202af6f66e0 (old id 4467333)
alternative location
http://swopec.hhs.se/lunewp/abs/lunewp2014_022.htm
date added to LUP
2016-04-04 11:44:05
date last changed
2018-11-21 21:06:51
@misc{36fe1d59-5a74-471e-a140-3202af6f66e0,
  abstract     = {{Engagement in foreign markets can have an impact on firm organization and on the type of occupations that a firm needs. We examine the effect of globalization on the occupational mix using detailed Swedish data that cover all firms and a representative sample of the labor force for 1997-2005. We find a robust relationship between a firm’s degree of international integration and its occupational mix. Multinationals, which are the most globally engaged firms, have a distribution of occupations skewed toward the more skilled. Non-multinational exporters have a distribution of occupations less skewed toward skilled compared to multinationals, but more skewed toward skilled occupations compared to Swedish non-exporters (which are the least globally engaged). Moreover, firms tend to have an even more skill intensive distribution of occupations when they mainly export to far away markets, or when they export differentiated goods. Our results are little changed (1) when we control for firm size, productivity, capital intensity, and firm age, (2) when we control for offshoring and R&D expenditures; (3) when we use alternative methods to rank occupations, or (4) when we conduct alternative robustness tests. In addition, the results are very similar for manufacturing and non-manufacturing, and for foreign and Swedish multinationals. We interpret our results using a decomposition motivated by recent theoretical models of selection into exporting and FDI.}},
  author       = {{Davidson, Carl and Heyman, Fredrik and Matusz, Steven and Sjöholm, Fredrik and Chun Zhu, Susan}},
  keywords     = {{Occupational mix; Globalization; Multinational Enterprises; Export; Firms}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  note         = {{Working Paper}},
  publisher    = {{Department of Economics, Lund University}},
  series       = {{Working Paper / Department of Economics, School of Economics and Management, Lund University}},
  title        = {{Global Engagement and the Occupational Structure of Firms}},
  url          = {{http://swopec.hhs.se/lunewp/abs/lunewp2014_022.htm}},
  volume       = {{22}},
  year         = {{2014}},
}