Type | Conference Paper - ICITE regional Conference |
Title | Trade and occupational employment in Mexico since Nafta |
Author(s) | |
Publication (Day/Month/Year) | |
City | Santiago |
Country/State | Chile |
URL | http://www.oecd.org/site/tadicite/48133857.pdf |
Abstract | We analyze the effects of trade liberalization on Mexican employment at an occupational level from 1992 to 2009. After ranking occupations by skill level, we find that the reduction in trade costs associated with Mexico's entry to NAFTA is related to larger employment expansions in low-skill occupations. This is evidence against a story of skilled-biased technological change, and in favor of a heterogeneous-firm model of trade in tasks where the offshoring cost of an occupation is positively related to its skill level. After NAFTA, labor demand for unskilled workers has increased and labor demand for skilled workers has been stagnant, even though supply of skilled workers has increased in the last 20 years. We provide intuitive evidence to identify a number of relevant bottlenecks in the Mexican economy. |
» | China - National Population Census 1990 |