The Gender-Biased Employment Effect of Exports: Evidence from China

Abstract

Traditional international trade theories believe export trade has a positive effect on employment, which means exports would increase the level of employment with no difference between genders. Based on enterprise heterogeneity, however, the new-trade theories doubt this conclusion. Using the Chinese industrial enterprise database (2006–2009), this paper re-examines the relationship between export volume and the level of employment, and discusses different effects of exports on the employment of different genders. We find that although exports increase the total level of employment, enterprises’ exports have a prominent negative effect on the employment of women. This proves that it is hard to optimize employment structure through the promotion of foreign trade, even if it improves the overall level of employment.

Keywords

screening-matching model / enterprise heterogeneity / gender differences

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2014 Higher Education Press and Brill