研討日期

2003年10月25日上午十點到下午一點

研討地點

經研所會議室

討論文獻

題目

作者

文獻出處

Multiproduct multinationals and reciprocal FDI dumping

Richard E. Baldwin and Gianmarco I.P. Ottaviano

Journal of International Economics 54 (2001) 429-448

報告人

蔡爵丞

參加人員

黃鴻、林燕淑、邱俊榮、楊雅博、吳世傑、梁文榮、胡均立、蔡宗秀、鄭義暉、陳宏易、郭虹瑩、許淑女英、黃璀娟、吳芝文、郭子綾、蔡爵丞、陳秀華

討論提要

The world pattern of foreign direct investment is remarkably similar to the world trade pattern, yet the mainstay theory of FDI has trade and FDI as substitutes. This paper posits a model where multiproduct firms simultaneously engage in intraindustry FDI and intraindustry trade in a manner that naturally leads to parallelism in the trade and FDI patterns. The model cannot explain all aspects of the trade and FDI correlation, and it is clearly irrelevant to some industries. It is, however, base on a novel motive for FDI.

 There are two approaches discussing about the FDI and trade. The first one is advantages approach, that multinationals must have some sort of advantage over local firms. The other is proximity versus scale approach, that single product firms must choose to either save on trade costs (by producing in proximity to their consumers) or to exploit scale economies (by consolidating production at home).

 Obstacles to trade generates a natural incentive for multiproduct firms to engage simultaneously in IIFDI and IIT.This model is “cross hauling” of foreign investment that generates two way trade in differential final products. It is analogous to the reciprocal dumping model because imperfect competition is the heart of these two models.

結論

    There are three cases discussing in this paper. The followings are the results of these three cases respectively.

    In the full symmetry case, IIFDI arises when varieties are sufficiently good substitutes (so the cannibalization effect is powerful), trade costs are sufficiently high (so geographical separation reduces cannibalization a lot), and the cost of multinationals is not too great.

    In the firm wise symmetry, the incentive to go multinational increases as a firm’s own varieties become better substitutes for each other relative to their substitutability with the other firm’s varieties. This incentive also rises with trade costs, but falls with the cost of multinational.

    In the matching product lines, a firm’s varieties are pair-wise good substitutes with their competitors’ goods. When the costs of multinational is sufficiently small, the cannibalization effect is thus always lower in the M-only outcome, and consequently M-outcome always dominates N-outcome.

    When two-way FDI arises, the ratio of operating profit to fixed cost is higher for local factory than it is for the factory abroad. In this case, the FDI may be thought of as reciprocal FDI dumping.

延伸研究

The approach in question may apply to the studies in international trade and spatial competition. We are going to file a study involving endogenous location decision and competitive price discrimination to examine the effect of firms’ location choices on the ability of their price discrimination. In addition, the effects of competitive price discrimination, while considering endogenous location, on the equilibrium price, consumers’ surplus and social welfare are also interesting.

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