Adjustment to Trade Opening: The Case of Labor Share in India's Manufacturing Industry

Prachi Gupta and Matthias Helble
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Prachi Gupta: Asian Development Bank Institute

No 845, ADBI Working Papers from Asian Development Bank Institute

Abstract: We study how manufacturing plants in India adjusted to trade liberalization during the period 1998–1999 to 2007–2008. We estimate how the labor share changed due to tariff reduction. Our results indicate that a decline in output tariffs led to an increase in the labor share of income. In contrast, a fall in input tariffs led to a decrease in the labor share. Controlling for factor intensity, we find that in technology-intensive and human capital resource-intensive sectors, both a decline in input and output tariff rates led to a decline in labor share. A fall in tariffs only led to an increase in labor share for labor-intensive and low-technology plants. Hence, India’s bias toward capital- and technology-intensive production explains the overall decline in labor share in the post reform period. Furthermore, the empirical results show that labor adjustment occurred more efficiently in Indian states with flexible labor laws.

Keywords: trade reforms; labor share; India; manufacturing (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F13 F16 F66 L60 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 22 pages
Date: 2018-05-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-int and nep-knm
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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Journal Article: Adjustment to trade opening: The case of labor share in India's manufacturing industry (2022)
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