IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/kob/dpaper/dp2015-29.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Effects on the Cross-Country Difference in the Minimum Wage on International Trade, Growth and Unemployment

Author

Listed:
  • Chihiro Inaba

    (Department of Economics, Kobe University)

  • Katsufumi Fukuda

    (Graduate School of Social Science, Hiroshima University, Japan and Research Institute for Economics & Business Administration (RIEB), Kobe University, Japan)

Abstract

We construct a dynamic general-equilibrium North-South growth model with international trade with both homogenous and heterogeneous firms, endogenous northern economic growth, and unemployment. Unemployment is emerged from the imbalance between the endogenous labor supply and the firms' labor demand under binding the minimum wage policy. The north produces two goods, high-tech good and low-tech good, while the South produces only low-tech good by the scarcity of technology. Both goods are traded between the countries. The production of the high-tech good needs R&D activity for variety creation, which is a source of economic growth. In this setting, we analyze the southern policy change that increases the southern minimum wage, and show that the increase in the southern minimum wage affects the structure of international trade and the northern growth rate and unemployment.

Suggested Citation

  • Chihiro Inaba & Katsufumi Fukuda, 2015. "Effects on the Cross-Country Difference in the Minimum Wage on International Trade, Growth and Unemployment," Discussion Paper Series DP2015-29, Research Institute for Economics & Business Administration, Kobe University.
    • Handle: RePEc:kob:dpaper:dp2015-29
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.rieb.kobe-u.ac.jp/academic/ra/dp/English/DP2015-29.pdf
    File Function: First version, 2015
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Nicholas Bloom & Mirko Draca & John Van Reenen, 2016. "Trade Induced Technical Change? The Impact of Chinese Imports on Innovation, IT and Productivity," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 83(1), pages 87-117.
    2. Hartmut Egger & Peter Egger & James R. Markusen, 2012. "International Welfare And Employment Linkages Arising From Minimum Wages," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 53(3), pages 771-790, August.
    3. Nicholas Bloom & Paul Romer & Stephen J Terry & John Van Reenen, 2021. "Trapped Factors and China’s Impact on Global Growth [Competition and innovation: an inverted-U relationship]," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 131(633), pages 156-191.
    4. David H. Autor & David Dorn & Gordon H. Hanson, 2013. "The China Syndrome: Local Labor Market Effects of Import Competition in the United States," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(6), pages 2121-2168, October.
    5. Wolf‐Heimo Grieben, 2009. "Can Countries with Severe Labor Market Frictions Gain from Globalization?," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 13(2), pages 230-247, May.
    6. Tony Fang & Carl Lin, 2015. "Minimum wages and employment in China," IZA Journal of Labor Policy, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 4(1), pages 1-30, December.
    7. Sener, Fuat, 2006. "Labor market rigidities and R&D-based growth in the global economy," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 30(5), pages 769-805, May.
    8. Jing Wang & Morley Gunderson, 2011. "Minimum Wage Impacts In China: Estimates From A Prespecified Research Design, 2000–2007," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 29(3), pages 392-406, July.
    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. Gan, Li & Hernandez, Manuel A. & Ma, Shuang, 2016. "The higher costs of doing business in China: Minimum wages and firms' export behavior," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 100(C), pages 81-94.
    2. Boddin, Dominik, 2018. "Imports, Exports and Domestic Innovation," VfS Annual Conference 2018 (Freiburg, Breisgau): Digital Economy 181640, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    3. David Autor & David Dorn & Gordon H. Hanson & Gary Pisano & Pian Shu, 2020. "Foreign Competition and Domestic Innovation: Evidence from US Patents," American Economic Review: Insights, American Economic Association, vol. 2(3), pages 357-374, September.
    4. Angus C. Chu & Haichao Fan & Yuichi Furukawa & Zonglai Kou & Xueyue Liu, 2021. "Minimum Wages, Import Status, And Firms' Innovation: Theory And Evidence From China," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 59(1), pages 441-458, January.
    5. Keller, Wolfgang & Utar, Hale, 2023. "International trade and job polarization: Evidence at the worker level," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 145(C).
    6. Andrei A Levchenko & Jing Zhang, 2013. "The Global Labor Market Impact of Emerging Giants: A Quantitative Assessment," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 61(3), pages 479-519, August.
    7. Markus Brueckner & Ngo Van Long & Joaquin L. Vespignani, 2020. "Non-Gravity Trade," Globalization Institute Working Papers 388, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
    8. John Van Reenen, 2018. "Increasing differences between firms: market power and the macro-economy," CEP Discussion Papers dp1576, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    9. Adam Jakubik & Victor Stolzenburg, 2021. "The ‘China Shock’ revisited: insights from value added trade flows," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 21(1), pages 67-95.
    10. Ujjayant Chakravorty & Runjuan Liu & Ruotao Tang, 2017. "Firm Innovation under Import Competition from Low-Wage Countries," CESifo Working Paper Series 6569, CESifo.
    11. Ufuk Akcigit & Sina T. Ates & Giammario Impullitti, 2018. "Innovation and Trade Policy in a Globalized World," NBER Working Papers 24543, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Daron Acemoglu & Gino Gancia & Fabrizio Zilibotti, 2015. "Offshoring and Directed Technical Change," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 7(3), pages 84-122, July.
    13. Katariina Nilsson Hakkala & Yao Pan, 2024. "Export competition with China and firms' coping strategies," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 91(364), pages 1454-1481, October.
    14. Zhang, Ming-ang & Lu, Shuling & Zhang, Sihan & Bai, Yanfeng, 2023. "The unintended consequence of minimum wage hikes: Evidence based on firms' pollution emission," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 125(C).
    15. Mayneris, Florian & Poncet, Sandra & Zhang, Tao, 2018. "Improving or disappearing: Firm-level adjustments to minimum wages in China," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 20-42.
    16. Christian Dippel & Robert Gold & Stephan Heblich & Rodrigo Pinto, 2017. "Instrumental Variables and Causal Mechanisms: Unpacking the Effect of Trade on Workers and Voters," CESifo Working Paper Series 6816, CESifo.
    17. Haoyuan Ding & Bo Pu & Tong Qi & Kai Wang, 2022. "Valuation effects of the US–China trade war: The effects of foreign managers and foreign exposure," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(3), pages 662-683, July.
    18. David H. Autor & David Dorn & Gordon H. Hanson & Jae Song, 2014. "Trade Adjustment: Worker-Level Evidence," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 129(4), pages 1799-1860.
    19. Alexandra Sotiriou & Andrés Rodríguez-Pose, 2021. "Chinese vs. US Trade in an Emerging Country: The Impact of Trade Openness in Chile," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 57(12), pages 2095-2111, December.
    20. Andrea Ariu & Katariina Nilsson Hakkala & J. Bradford Jensen & Saara Tamminen, 2019. "Service Imports, Workforce Composition, and Firm Performance: Evidence from Finnish Microdata," NBER Working Papers 26355, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:kob:dpaper:dp2015-29. 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: Office of Promoting Research Collaboration, Research Institute for Economics & Business Administration, Kobe University (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/rikobjp.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.