The Effect of Trade Liberalization on Wages and Employment: The Case of New Zealand

Kevin Lang

Journal of Labor Economics, 1998, vol. 16, issue 4, 792-814

Abstract: Prior to trade liberalization in the l980s, New Zealand heavily protected low-wage industries. Consequently, trade liberalization was desirable from the perspective of both traditional and new trade theories. While liberalization decreased employment in protected industries somewhat, it also significantly affected wages, noticeably diminishing the effect of liberalization on employment in previously protected industries and, thus, reducing the postliberalization shift in the industrial composition of employment. The small effect of liberalization on the composition of employment suggests that the effect of tariffs on wages and firms' monopoly power substantially eliminated any effect of protection on the distribution of employment. Copyright 1998 by University of Chicago Press.

Date: 1998
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/209906 full text (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers. See http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/JOLE for details.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ucp:jlabec:v:16:y:1998:i:4:p:792-814

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Labor Economics from University of Chicago Press
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Journals Division ().