Where do MNEs expand production: Location choices of the pharmaceutical industry in Europe after 1992

Differences in regulations, technical standards and national medical cultures across EU member states created a highly segmented pharmaceutical market in Europe prior to the implementation of the Single Market Programme. The subsequent reduction in non-tariff barriers to trade would be expected to have an impact on where pharmaceutical multinationals locate production within the EU. Using discrete-choice models, we study the determinants of multinationals' location choices in terms of expanded production at existing facilities. Our results support the findings of New Economic Geography models that predict reduced rather than increased agglomeration in the face of trade-cost reductions

Measuring sectoral patterns of US investment in EU member countries, 1983 - 1994

This paper analyses the sectoral distribution of US investment across EU member countries. We attempt to determine whether investment is sectorally concentrated by country and whether there seems to be any evidence of increased sectoral specialisation in US investment as the EU market has become more integrated. Our empirical results indicate that US investment is relatively sectorally concentrated by country and that there has been some slight increase in specialisation in mainly small and peripheral member countries, while in most of the large core EU countries, no increase in specialisation is evident. (3,564 words

Linkages between multinationals and indigenous firms: evidence for the electronics sector in Ireland

This paper analyses the concept of linkages and studies the development and the determinants of inter-firm linkages between electronics firms in Ireland and domestic sub-suppliers using firm level data for 1982 to 1995. We discuss the concept of inter-firm linkages and the effects of linkages. We argue that the concept of linkages developed by Hirschman (1958) is an inter-sectoral concept which can arise as a result of underlying inter-firm linkages. Our empirical analysis indicates that foreign-owned electronic firms in Ireland source, on average, 24 per cent of their inputs in Ireland, which compares favourably with an estimate for foreign firms in Scottish electronics industries. In an econometric estimation, using panel data techniques, we find that firms in the Irish electronics sector increase their backward linkages over time; that foreign firms have lower linkages than Irish-owned firms; and that large and expanding firms have lower linkages than other firms

European integration and peripherality: are there lessons from Ireland?

This paper suggests that the process of economic integration can generate positive effects for peripheral economies by increasing their attractiveness as a production base for multinational companies. Such investment is likely in the case of goods for which transportation costs are relatively low. Our analysis shows that US investment in Ireland illustrates this process, having increased considerably after 1992, in particular in the "weightless" electronics sector. It shows, however, that other peripheral countries in the EU, namely Greece, Portugal and Spain, have not been successful in attracting a proportionate share of the increased US investment following the process of integration. This suggests that economic integration may be a necessary, but not a sufficient condition for a peripheral country to attract MNCs; other variables such as language and culture, industrial policy and developing agglomerations also count

Reflections on Irish industrial policy towards foreign direct investment

Irish policy towards foreign direct investment has evolved since the 1950s as a strategy driven primarily by the use of fiscal incentives to enhance the profitability of locating in Ireland, with grants as required to achieve a particular bargaining advantage in competing against alternative international locations. Our empirical analysis of European firms in Ireland suggests that the investment incentives offered appear to have led to significant gross job gains in the targeted high-tech sectors, as proxied here by the Metals & Engineering and Chemicals sectors. However, these gross gains have not translated into net gains of a similar magnitude

The determinants of firm start-up size: a comparison of Ireland and Portugal

In this paper we provide empirical evidence on the determinants of firm start-up size using data for the manufacturing sector in Ireland, and compare our results with recent findings for Portuguese manufacturing industries (Mata and Machado, 1996). To allow for firm heterogeneity between firm entrants we use quantile regression techniques for our empirical estimation. We find that the determinants of start-up size differ in their importance for small and large-scale entrants. In particular, industry size and industry growth seem to affect largescale entrants only

International capital mobility, shadow prices and the cost of protection

This paper studies the welfare losses from tariff protection in a general model of a small open economy where some factors are internationally mobile. It is show that, as long as the economy remains incompletely specialised, international factor mobility must raise the cost of protection. This result is illustrated in the context of the specific-factors and Heckscher-Ohlin models. In addition, its relationship to earlier work on immiserising captial inflows on negative shadow prices for factors of production is examined, which allows us to synthesise a number of recent results within a common framework.Not applicableA hard copy is available in UCD Library at GEN 330.08 IR/UN

Exports and Productivity: Comparable Evidence for 14 Countries

We use comparable micro level panel data for 14 countries and a set of identically specified empirical models to investigate the relationship between exports and productivity. Our overall results are in line with the big picture that is by now familiar from the literature: Exporters are more productive than non-exporters when observed and unobserved heterogeneity are controlled for, and these exporter productivity premia tend to increase with the share of exports in total sales; there is strong evidence in favour of self-selection of more productive firms into export markets, but nearly no evidence in favour of the learning-by-exporting hypothesis. We document that the exporter premia differ considerably across countries in identically specified empirical models. In a meta-analysis of our results we find that countries that are more open and have more effective government report higher productivity premia. However, the level of development per se does not appear to be an explanation for the observed cross-country differences.exports; productivity; micro data; international comparison