What's the use of factor contents?

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Leamer, EE
• 署名单位: University of California System; University of California Los Angeles
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0022-1996
• DOI: 10.1016/S0022-1996(99)00004-5
• 发表日期: 2000
• 页码: 17-49
• 关键词: factor contents; trade and wages

摘要

The net imports of labor embodied in US international trade has been a fairly small and stable share of the US labor force. From this fact one would like to draw two conclusions: (1) Trade barriers would not have had much effect on earnings. (2) It is technology, not trade that is the driving force for rising income inequality in the US. The first conclusion is valid if the US economy is log-linear and the number of tradables is equal to the number of factors. The second is valid if the global economy is log-linear and the number of tradables is equal to the number of factors. I am inclined to accept the first argument as an adequate approximation, but to reject the second because it relies too heavily on highly implausible assumptions which are incompatible with the data. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.