The “China Shock” revisited: Insights from value added trade flows

Decomposed trade flows enable us to address identification and measurement issues inherent to gross trade data. In particular, it allows us to remove US value added in Chinese exports from the exposure measure which is mechanically correlated with the dependent variable and overstates the volume of the trade shock. In addition, the decomposition permits to correct for double counting, to remove primary and services inputs in manufacturing exports, and to assign competition to the upstream industry that supplied the value added rather than the final exporting industry. This further reduces the volume of the shock and improves the accuracy of the import exposure measure. Consequently, we find considerable differences in the pattern of regions that are most affected by the trade shock and show that imports from China can explain less of the decline in US manufacturing than what gross trade data would suggest. We then separate the shock into a China-driven domestic reform and a thirdcountry-driven value chain component, and find in line with ADH that the smaller, but still negative labour market effects are indeed China driven. Finally, we observe that the negative effects identified in ADH are not present in the 2008-2014 period, as labour market adjustment has largely concluded. The long time needed for adjustment may have been prolonged by the evolution of China’s comparative advantage.

No: ERSD-2018-10

Authors: Adam Jakubik and Victor Stolzenburg

Manuscript date: October 2018

Key Words:

value added trade, labor-market adjustment, local labor markets

JEL classification numbers:

E24; F14; F16; J23; L60; R23

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Disclaimer 

This is a working paper, and hence it represents research in progress. The opinions expressed in this paper are those of its author. They are not intended to represent the positions or opinions of the WTO or its members and are without prejudice to members' rights and obligations under the WTO. Any errors are attributable to the author.

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