TY - JOUR
T1 - Decomposing Firm-Level Sales variation
AU - Munch, Jakob Roland
AU - Nguyen, Daniel Xuyen
N1 - JEL classification: F12, C24
PY - 2014/10
Y1 - 2014/10
N2 - Recently, much of the trade literature has been focused on using firm-specific productivity to explain export heterogeneity. This study provides evidence for the importance of incorporating firm-destination-specific effects such as demand shocks in theories of exporter heterogeneity. Our study estimates the proportion of firm-level sales variation within a product-destination market that can be explained by firm-specific effects such as productivity. We use a highly detailed dataset comprising firm-product-destination-specific exports and correct for truncation as modeled by recent trade theories. We find that the contribution of firm-specific effects varies greatly across products and that it is 45% for the median product. That is, within-destination sales variation is primarily explained by firm-destination-specific heterogeneity for the majority of products.
AB - Recently, much of the trade literature has been focused on using firm-specific productivity to explain export heterogeneity. This study provides evidence for the importance of incorporating firm-destination-specific effects such as demand shocks in theories of exporter heterogeneity. Our study estimates the proportion of firm-level sales variation within a product-destination market that can be explained by firm-specific effects such as productivity. We use a highly detailed dataset comprising firm-product-destination-specific exports and correct for truncation as modeled by recent trade theories. We find that the contribution of firm-specific effects varies greatly across products and that it is 45% for the median product. That is, within-destination sales variation is primarily explained by firm-destination-specific heterogeneity for the majority of products.
U2 - 10.1016/j.jebo.2014.06.012
DO - 10.1016/j.jebo.2014.06.012
M3 - Journal article
SN - 0167-2681
VL - 106
SP - 317
EP - 334
JO - Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization
JF - Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization
ER -