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Outsourcing and Inequality. CEPS Working Document No. 187, October 2002

Anderton, Bob and Brenton, Paul and Oscarsson, Eva. (2002) Outsourcing and Inequality. CEPS Working Document No. 187, October 2002. [Working Paper]

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    Abstract

    This paper brings together and analyses the results of empirical analyses which, in contrast to most other studies, find that trade has been a significant cause of labour market inequality in various industrialised countries. The approach is based upon the concept of outsourcing – whereby the low-skill parts of the production chain are ‘outsourced’ to low-wage countries. A distinguishing feature of the empirical work is the use of highly detailed trade data, which allow imports from high- and low-wage countries to be separately identified at the industry level. Using cost minimisation framework, we show that imports from low-wage countries have made a significant contribution to the decline in the wage-bill share and/or relative employment of less-skilled workers in the UK, the USA, Sweden and Italy. We also show how the country-specific characteristics of outsourcing can lead to quite different inequality outcomes in different countries. In line with other studies, we also find that technology has played an important role in causing the increase in inequality in many countries. However, there is also some evidence that some of the rapid increase in the application of new technologies in recent decades has been trade-induced through mechanisms such as 'defensive innovation'.

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    Item Type: Working Paper
    Subjects for non-EU documents: EU policies and themes > External relations > EU-US
    Countries > U.K.
    Countries > Italy
    EU policies and themes > Policies & related activities > employment/labour market > employment/unemployment
    Countries > Sweden
    Subjects for EU documents: UNSPECIFIED
    EU Series and Periodicals: UNSPECIFIED
    EU Annual Reports: UNSPECIFIED
    Series: Series > Centre for European Policy Studies (Brussels) > CEPS Working Documents
    Depositing User: Phil Wilkin
    Official EU Document: No
    Language: English
    Date Deposited: 04 Oct 2009
    Page Range: p. 27
    Last Modified: 15 Feb 2011 18:16
    URI: http://aei.pitt.edu/id/eprint/11673

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