IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/restud/v86y2019i2p526-563..html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Carry-Along Trade

Author

Listed:
  • Andrew B Bernard
  • Emily J Blanchard
  • Ilke Van Beveren
  • Hylke Vandenbussche

Abstract

Large multi-product firms dominate international trade flows. Using novel linked production and export data at the firm-product level, we find that the overwhelming majority of manufacturing firms export products that they do not produce. Three quarters of the exported products and 30% of export value from Belgian manufacturers are in goods that are not produced by the firm, so-called Carry-Along Trade (CAT). The number of CAT products is strongly increasing in firm productivity while the number of produced products that are exported is weakly increasing in firm productivity. We propose a general model of production and sourcing at multi-product firms and explore new demand- and supply-side modelling features capable of generating predictions consistent with the empirical findings. Export price data and company interviews offer suggestive evidence for the presence of demand-scope complementarities.

Suggested Citation

  • Andrew B Bernard & Emily J Blanchard & Ilke Van Beveren & Hylke Vandenbussche, 2019. "Carry-Along Trade," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 86(2), pages 526-563.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:restud:v:86:y:2019:i:2:p:526-563.
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/restud/rdy006
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Thierry Mayer & Marc J. Melitz & Gianmarco I. P. Ottaviano, 2021. "Market Size, Competition, and the Product Mix of Exporters," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Firms and Workers in a Globalized World Larger Markets, Tougher Competition, chapter 5, pages 109-150, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    2. Andrew B. Bernard & J. Bradford Jensen & Stephen J. Redding & Peter K. Schott, 2010. "Wholesalers and Retailers in US Trade," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(2), pages 408-413, May.
    3. Andrew B. Bernard & Stephen J. Redding & Peter K. Schott, 2009. "Products and Productivity," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 111(4), pages 681-709, December.
    4. Jan De Loecker, 2011. "Product Differentiation, Multiproduct Firms, and Estimating the Impact of Trade Liberalization on Productivity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 79(5), pages 1407-1451, September.
    5. Andrew B. Bernard & J. Bradford Jensen & Stephen J. Redding & Peter K. Schott, 2007. "Firms in International Trade," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 21(3), pages 105-130, Summer.
    6. repec:hal:wpspec:info:hdl:2441/c8dmi8nm4pdjkuc9g8m210prh is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Jan De Loecker & Pinelopi K. Goldberg & Amit K. Khandelwal & Nina Pavcnik, 2016. "Prices, Markups, and Trade Reform," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 84, pages 445-510, March.
    8. Dimitra Petropoulou, 2007. "Information Costs, Networks and Intermediation in International Trade," Economics Series Working Papers 370, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    9. Anders Akerman, 2018. "A theory on the role of wholesalers in international trade based on economies of scope," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 51(1), pages 156-185, February.
    10. Monika Mrázová & J Peter Neary, 2019. "Selection Effects with Heterogeneous Firms," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 17(4), pages 1294-1334.
    11. Pinelopi K Goldberg & Amit K Khandelwal & Nina Pavcnik & Petia Topalova, 2010. "Multiproduct Firms and Product Turnover in the Developing World: Evidence from India," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 92(4), pages 1042-1049, November.
    12. Swati Dhingra, 2013. "Trading Away Wide Brands for Cheap Brands," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(6), pages 2554-2584, October.
    13. Costas Arkolakis & Sharat Ganapati & Marc-Andreas Muendler, 2021. "The Extensive Margin of Exporting Products: A Firm-Level Analysis," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 13(4), pages 182-245, October.
    14. 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.
    15. Andrew B. Bernard & Marco Grazzi & Chiara Tomasi, 2010. "Intermediaries in International Trade: direct versus indirect modes of export," LEM Papers Series 2010/19, Laboratory of Economics and Management (LEM), Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies, Pisa, Italy.
    16. Eckel, Carsten & Iacovone, Leonardo & Javorcik, Beata & Neary, J. Peter, 2015. "Multi-product firms at home and away: Cost- versus quality-based competence," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(2), pages 216-232.
    17. Carsten Eckel & J. Peter Neary, 2010. "Multi-Product Firms and Flexible Manufacturing in the Global Economy," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 77(1), pages 188-217.
    18. Thierry Mayer & Gianmarco Ottaviano, 2008. "The Happy Few: The Internationalisation of European Firms," Intereconomics: Review of European Economic Policy, Springer;ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics;Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS), vol. 43(3), pages 135-148, May.
    19. Lucia Foster & John Haltiwanger & Chad Syverson, 2008. "Reallocation, Firm Turnover, and Efficiency: Selection on Productivity or Profitability?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(1), pages 394-425, March.
    20. Hortaçsu, Ali & Syverson, Chad, 2009. "Why Do Firms Own Production Chains?," Working Papers 227, The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, George J. Stigler Center for the Study of the Economy and the State.
    21. Ahn, JaeBin & Khandelwal, Amit K. & Wei, Shang-Jin, 2011. "The role of intermediaries in facilitating trade," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(1), pages 73-85, May.
    22. Leonardo Iacovone & BeataS. Javorcik, 2010. "Multi-Product Exporters: Product Churning, Uncertainty and Export Discoveries," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 120(544), pages 481-499, May.
    23. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/c8dmi8nm4pdjkuc9g8m210prh is not listed on IDEAS
    24. James E. Rauch & Joel Watson, 2004. "Network Intermediaries in International Trade," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 13(1), pages 69-93, March.
    25. Caves, Douglas W & Christensen, Laurits R & Diewert, W Erwin, 1982. "The Economic Theory of Index Numbers and the Measurement of Input, Output, and Productivity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(6), pages 1393-1414, November.
    26. James E. Rauch, 2001. "Business and Social Networks in International Trade," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 39(4), pages 1177-1203, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Andrew B. Bernard & Ilke Van Beveren & Hylke Vandenbussche, 2010. "Multi-product exporters, carry-along trade and the margins of trade," Working Paper Research 203, National Bank of Belgium.
    2. Andrew B. Bernard & J. Bradford Jensen & Stephen J. Redding & Peter K. Schott, 2012. "The Empirics of Firm Heterogeneity and International Trade," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 4(1), pages 283-313, July.
    3. Jože Damijan & Jozef Konings & Sašo Polanec, 2013. "Pass-on trade: why do firms simultaneously engage in two-way trade in the same varieties?," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 149(1), pages 85-111, March.
    4. repec:lic:licosd:30712 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Arnarson, Björn Thor, 2020. "The superstar and the followers: Intra-firm product complementarity in international trade," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 177(C), pages 277-304.
    6. repec:lic:licosd:31212 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Andrew B. Bernard & Ilke Van Beveren & Hylke Vandenbussche, 2014. "Multi-Product Exporters and the Margins of Trade," The Japanese Economic Review, Japanese Economic Association, vol. 65(2), pages 142-157, June.
    8. Michael Irlacher, 2022. "Multi-product Firms in International Economics," Economics working papers 2022-01, Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria.
    9. Erbahar, Aksel & Rebeyrol, Vincent, 2023. "Trade intermediation by producers," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    10. Johannes Boehm & Swati Dhingra & John Morrow, 2022. "The Comparative Advantage of Firms," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 130(12), pages 3025-3100.
    11. Manova, Kalina & Yu, Zhihong, 2017. "Multi-product firms and product quality," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 116-137.
    12. Crozet, Matthieu & Lalanne, Guy & Poncet, Sandra, 2013. "Wholesalers in international trade," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 1-17.
    13. Daniel Baumgarten & Michael Irlacher & Karin Mayr‐Dorn, 2022. "Internationalization strategies of multi‐product firms: The role of technology," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 55(4), pages 1929-1965, November.
    14. Andrew B. Bernard & J. Bradford Jensen & Stephen J. Redding & Peter K. Schott, 2018. "Global Firms," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 56(2), pages 565-619, June.
    15. Andrew B. Bernard & Marco Grazzi & Chiara Tomasi, 2010. "Intermediaries in International Trade: direct versus indirect modes of export," LEM Papers Series 2010/19, Laboratory of Economics and Management (LEM), Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies, Pisa, Italy.
    16. Defever, Fabrice & Imbruno, Michele & Kneller, Richard, 2020. "Trade liberalization, input intermediaries and firm productivity: Evidence from China," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(C).
    17. Nakhoda, Aadil, 2012. "The effect of foreign competition on product switching activities: A firm level analysis," MPRA Paper 39167, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/1dn2prktaq9p3949il1h9ds86b is not listed on IDEAS
    19. Dasgupta, Kunal & Mondria, Jordi, 2018. "Quality uncertainty and intermediation in international trade," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 68-91.
    20. R. Monin & M. Suarez Castillo, 2020. "Product switching, market power and distance to core competency," Documents de Travail de l'Insee - INSEE Working Papers g2020-06, Institut National de la Statistique et des Etudes Economiques.
    21. Sharat Ganapati, 2018. "The Modern Wholesaler: Global Sourcing, Domestic Distribution, and Scale Economies," Working Papers 18-49, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    22. Chakraborty, Pavel & Henry, Michael, 2019. "Chinese competition and product variety of Indian firms," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(2), pages 367-395.
    23. Melitz, Marc J. & Redding, Stephen J., 2014. "Heterogeneous Firms and Trade," Handbook of International Economics, in: Gopinath, G. & Helpman, . & Rogoff, K. (ed.), Handbook of International Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 0, pages 1-54, Elsevier.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Heterogeneous firms; Multi-product firms; Exporting; Sourcing; Productivity; Intermediation; Demand-scope complementarity;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F12 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Models of Trade with Imperfect Competition and Scale Economies; Fragmentation
    • F13 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade Policy; International Trade Organizations
    • F14 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Empirical Studies of Trade
    • L11 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Production, Pricing, and Market Structure; Size Distribution of Firms

    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:oup:restud:v:86:y:2019:i:2:p:526-563.. 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: Oxford University Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://academic.oup.com/restud .

    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.