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Offshore assembly and NIC-manufactured exports to the United States: Changing correlates of success

  • Development Research
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Abstract

Comparative studies of the NICs usually show that their success at exporting manufactures to the North is unrelated to the role of intrafirm trade and subcontracting in their exports, since in some very successful NICs intrafirm trade has played a small and diminishing role. This study explores hyptheses suggesting why intrafirm trade and subcontracting may become more important factors in NIC exports because of the changing composition of their exports, changing technology, and developed country protectionism. Data on the share of eight developing countries' manufactured exports to the United States under offshore assembly provision (OAP) item 807.00 are tested for their changing importance to export growth over the period 1970 to 1984. For all NICs, the share of their exports to the United States under OAP became more positively related to export performance in the 1980s than it had been in the 1970s. For Asian NICs, non-OAP exports continued to outperform OAP exports.

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  1. Keith Alger
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Keith Alger is research associate at Fundaçao Par Brasil, CEPLAC/CEPEC, Itabuna, Bahia, Brazil. His current research is on the politics of industrial adjustment, technological change, and the NICs.

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Alger, K. Offshore assembly and NIC-manufactured exports to the United States: Changing correlates of success. St Comp Int Dev 25, 35–55 (1990). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02806289

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