FS I V 91 - 2
T r a d e S t r u c t u r e a n d C o m p e t i t i v e n e s s i n t h e H a i n O E C D E c o n o m i e s
K i r s t y S . H u g h e s
J a n u a r y 1991
I S S N Nr. 072 2 - 674 8
F o r s c h u n g s s c h w e r p u n k t M a r k t p r o z e ß u n d U n t e r n e h m e n s e n t w i c k l u n g (IIHV) R e s e a r c h U n i t
H a r k e t P r o c e s s e s a n d
C o r p o r a t e D e v e l o p m e n t (IIH)
T h i s p a p e r a n a l y s e s t h e s t r u c t u r e a n d t r e n d s in c o m p e t i t i v e n e s s of t h e l e a d i n g s i x O E C D e c o n o m i e s in t h e 1980s, f o c u s i n g in
p a r t i c u l a r o n t r e n d s b y t e c h n o l o g y g r o u p . A l t h o u g h t h e s i x
e c o n o m i e s a r e s i m i l a r in t h e i r p a t t e r n of e x p o r t s t h e y v a r y w i d e l y in t h e i r p a t t e r n of c o m p e t i t i v e n e s s . T h e r e is n o s u p p o r t f o r t h e v i e w t h a t t h e E C e c o n o m i e s a r e m o r e s i m i l a r t o e a c h o t h e r t h a n t o t h e U S o r J a p a n . In t e r m s of s t r u c t u r e I t a l y is t h e m o s t
d i s t i n c t i v e . A l l c o u n t r i e s s h o w a s h i f t t o w a r d s h i g h t e c h n o l o g y e x p o r t s b u t m e d i u m t e c h n o l o g y e x p o r t s r e m a i n t h e l a r g e s t e x c e p t in t h e c a s e o f Italy. T h e m o s t n o t a b l e t r e n d s w i t h r e s p e c t t o
t e c h n o l o g y c l a s s e s is a d e t e r i o r a t i o n in U S r e l a t i v e
c o m p e t i t i v e n e s s in m e d i u m t e c h n o l o g y p r o d u c t s a n d i n r e l a t i v e J a p a n e s e c o m p e t i t i v e n e s s in l o w t e c h n o l o g y p r o d u c t s .
Z U S A M M E N F A S S U N G
A u ß e n h a n d e l s s t r u k t u r u n d W e t t b e w e r b s f ä h i g k e i t d e r g r o ß e n V o l k s w i r t s c h a f t e n d e r O E C D
S t r u k t u r e n u n d T r e n d s d e r W e t t b e w e r b s f ä h i g k e i t d e r f ü h r e n d e n O E C D - L ä n d e r w e r d e n in d i e s e m B e i t r a g f ü r d i e 8 0 e r J a h r e u n s e r e s J a h r h u n d e r t s u n t e r s u c h t . D i e A n a l y s e k o n z e n t r i e r t s i c h d a b e i b e s o n d e r s a u f d r e i G r u p p e n v o n E x p o r t g ü t e r n , d i e s i c h in i h r e r T e c h n o l o
g i e i n t e n s i t ä t u n t e r s c h e i d e n . O b w o h l d i e s e c h s V o l k s w i r t s c h a f t e n e i n e ä h n l i c h e E x p o r t s t r u k t u r a u f w e i s e n , u n t e r s c h e i d e n s i e s i c h j e d o c h e r h e b l i c h in i h r e r W e t t b e w e r b s f ä h i g k e i t . D i e E r g e b n i s s e u n t e r s t ü t z e n n i c h t d i e A n s i c h t , d a ß e t w a V o l k s w i r t s c h a f t e n a u s d e r E G e i n a n d e r ä h n l i c h e r w ä r e n a l s i m V e r g l e i c h z u d e n U S A o d e r J a p a n . B e s o n d e r s c h a r a k t e r i s t i s c h i s t d i e S t r u k t u r d e s i t a l i e n i s c h e n E x p o r t s . G ü t e r m i t t l e r e r T e c h n o l o g i e i n t e n s i t ä t s t e l l e n n o c h i m m e r in a l l e n L ä n d e r n , a u ß e r i m F a l l e I t a l i e n s , d e n g r ö ß t e n A n t e i l a m E x p o r t , o b w o h l s i c h i n s g e s a m t e i n e V e r s c h i e b u n g in R i c h t u n g d e s E x p o r t s v o n H o c h t e c h n o l o g i e g ü t e r n z eigt. D e r b e a c h t e n s w e r t e s t e T r e n d h i n s i c h t l i c h d e s E x p o r t s n a c h t e c h n o l o g i s c h e n G ü t e r g r u p p e n l i e g t in d e r V e r s c h l e c h t e r u n g d e r r e l a t i v e n W e t t b e w e r b s f ä h i g k e i t d e r U S A in d e r G r u p p e m i t m i t t l e r e r T e c h n o l o g i e i n t e n s i t ä t u n d d e r J a p a n s in d e r m i t g e r i n g e r T e c h n o l o g i e
i n t e n s i t ä t .
* T h e a u t h o r is g r a t e f u l t o D a v i d A u d r e t s c h , M i c h a e l K n e t t e r a n d p a r t i c i p a n t s a t s e m i n a r s a t t h e I t a l i a n N a t i o n a l R e s e a r c h
C o u n c i l in R o m e a n d T u r i n f o r c o m m e n t s o n t h i s p a p e r . R e m a i n i n g e r r o r s a r e t h e a u t h o r ' s r e s p o n s i b i l i t y .
Trade Structure and Competitiveness o f the Main OECD Economies
Introduction
This paper compares the structure o f trade and the relative competitiveness o f the six main OECD economies in the 1980s. It considers the extent o f similarity or dissim ilarity in these econom ies’ trade structures across industries and in their patterns o f competitiveness. In par
ticular, it questions whether the four largest EC economies are indeed more similar to each other than to the US and Japan and whether divergence or convergence is more likely p o st-1992. It also compares these econom ies’ relative positions with respect to the technology-intensity o f their trade.
A conventional picture o f the relative positions o f the six economies focused on here - the US, Japan, Germany, France, the UK and Italy - would be that all these economies have tended to converge over time, that the EC four are more similar to each other than to their main competitors and that EC performance is relatively poor, particularly in technology-intensive sectors and in the 1980s due to so-called ’eurosclerosis’. Further, future competitiveness depends on ability in the high-technology sectors, EC performance will improve p o st-1992 and finally, 1992 itself will not lead to m ajor re-adjustment and relocation o f econom ic activity within the EC, rather benefits may flow from scale, product differentiation and intra-industry trade. (See EC1988, Buigues et al 1990). Here we look at trade structure and trade perform ance of these six economies focusing on m anufacturing industry at a disaggregation level o f 80 4-digit International Standard Industrial Classification (ISIC) industries to see what was happening to the pattern of, and the trends in, these econom ies’ relative trade positions in the 1980s. To summarise the results in advance, the statistics analysed here for the 1980s suggest that: ’eurosclerosis’ was a tem porary or cyclical phenomenon; that - whether analysing perform ance or structural characteristics - the EC four do not form a clear group distinguishable from the US and Japan; that in terms o f structure o f exports these economies are similar but in terms o f competitiveness these six economies are neither very similar nor converging; and that the emphasis on high technology may be misplaced. The implications for the pattern o f competitiveness post-1992 m ay then be rather different from previous predictions.
Trade and Trade Performance 1980-1987
In this section we use 4-digit ISIC data for manufacturing industry exports and imports - this gives a disaggregation level o f 80 industries. (The appendix gives further information on data sources). The data are annual from 1980 to 1987.
Table One gives OECD export shares o f the six countries in the 1980s for m anufacturing industry.
Japan and Germany both increase their export shares over the period, Italy is roughly constant and the rem aining three - US, UK and France - lose share. All the EC four lose export share to 1984 but make at least some partial recovery by 1987. Thus, despite a 5 percentage point fall in the EC4 share by 1984, four percentage points have been recovered by 1987. The problem o f eurosclerosis , at least with respect to trade, can be seen to have been essentially a cyclical phenomenon o f the early 1980s with all the EC four recovering by 1987 though France and the UK do not regain their 1980 positions. The worst perform ance over the period as a whole is that o f the US.
The stability or otherwise o f total shares provides no information on w hat is happening to the industrial structure o f trade or the pattern o f competitiveness. W e employ two m easures to assess the structure o f trade and two to measure competitiveness. The simplest measure o f structure is simply to look at the percentage distribution o f exports across industries and to consider its stability or otherwise over time and its similarity across countries. A second m easure o f structure o f trade is to look at the extent o f intra-industry trade in different industries. This is also an important measure since it is expected that the more sim ilar these economies are, the more they will trade on an intra-industry basis and not according to com parative advantage. Estim ates by Smith and Venables (1988) suggest many benefits accruing precisely due to intra-industry trade potential. W e measure intra-industry trade using the G rubel-Lloyd index i.e.
(1) I I T i j = 1 -
X . . - M.
X. . + M.
where X denotes exports, M imports, i represents industry, and j country. The two m easures o f competitiveness we adopt are the net trade balance and the index o f revealed comparative advantage. The net trade balance is measured as:
(2 ) N T B i:j
+ M. .
and the index o f revealed comparative advantage is m easured as:
(3 )R C A lzj
X. . / ZX. .
l j J J
Z X . . / Z Z X . . 11 . . i i i J ID J
w h e r e j = 1 . . 2 4
i . e . t h e OECD c o u n t r i e s
Table two presents information on the stability o f the structure o f trade and the pattern of competitiveness o f each o f the six economies, through correlating each o f the four measures over time - in 1980 and 1987 i.e. it considers the extent o f change within each country not cross-countries. The correlations are mostly very high. Thus export structures have remained very similar over the 1980s as have patterns o f competitiveness. The US and UK exhibit the largest changes in their patterns o f competitiveness over the 1980s more strongly so in net trade than revealed comparative advantage. In terms o f intra-industry trade m ore change is apparent, with the US followed by the UK and then Japan exhibiting the largest changes. Overall, though, the pattern is one o f stability with the two economies with the worst trade perform ance in the 1980s exhibiting the largest changes, suggesting that change may be associated with decline while the stronger economies perhaps build cumulatively on existing advantages.
Table three presents the correlations across the economies for their export distribution in 1987.
This is an unsurprising picture showing as it does a fairly high level o f sim ilarity across the six economies. The highest correlation is between Germany and France, the lowest between Italy and the US. The least similar o f all the economies is Italy. Japan is m ost sim ilar to Germany and the UK is most similar to the US. There is not support from these correlations then for a view that the EC economies are more similar to each other than they are to the US and Japan, nor that the US and Japan are more sim ilar to each other than they are to the individual EC economies.
Table four presents correlations across countries for intra-industry trade in 1987. These corre
lations are mostly positive but very much lower than the correlations for exports. The highest correlation is for the UK and France, the lowest - negative - for the US and Italy. France exhibits the greatest degree o f similarity to all the other economies. Germany is m ost sim ilar to Japan, however, Japan is most similar to the UK while the US is most similar to France. Again these correlations do not suggest a distinct EC picture relative to the US and Japan. Overall, they indicate only a fairly low level o f similarity in intra-industry trade patterns.
Tables five and six present correlations across countries o f our two measures o f competitiveness - revealed comparative advantage (RCA) and the net trade balance. The lack o f similarity in RCA is striking - the majority o f the correlations are negative. They are also mostly fairly small - the highest in absolute terms being that between the US and Italy, -0.34. This is then neither a story o f strong similarity or o f strong dissimilarity. It suggests they share sim ilarity in some industries but not others and so the overall picture is one o f no relationship in their patterns o f RCA. The construction o f the RCA index means that we would not expect each country to be identical and if we were taking all 24 OECD countries that would not be possible. Nevertheless, these results are striking in the lack o f similarity they indicate especially in the case o f the EC
four. Neven (1990) argues that the nothem European economies should not expect much alte
ration in their comparative advantages after 1992. These results suggest that in fact these countries are neither facing a situation o f great similarity - which m ight p o st-1992 result either in fierce competition and transferral o f resources across-countries o r in little change, if their levels o f competitiveness were similar, - nor are they facing a situation o f specialisation, when little relocation m ight be expected. Rather, these results suggest that p o st-1992 there will be scope for considerable restructuring even among these four EC economies. They do not suggest any very different picture with respect to the US and Japan either - one o f relatively weak dissimilarity.
Table six presents the correlation o f net trade balances across countries in 1987. These corre
lations are mostly positive and are stronger than those for RCA. They are, nevertheless, on the whole fairly weak, except in the case o f Germany which exhibits a strong positive association with Japan (the highest), the US and the UK. Italy again shows a very different picture, but is most similar to Japan. The US is most similar to Germany and then the UK. France is most similar to Germany but this is a rather low correlation. Yet again, there is no evidence that the EC four are more similar to each other than to the US or Japan nor is there m ostly evidence of very similar patterns o f net trade - eight o f the fifteen correlations are below 0.25. The fairly high correlation o f Germany and the U K m ay be a cause for concern for the U K in the p o st-1992 period, given the superior level o f German competitiveness. These results can be com pared to those o f Archibugi and Pianta (1990) who look at the technological specialisation o f the EC, US and Japan. They find negative correlations between each o f these three groups suggesting dissim ilarity between all three. Our results rather than suggesting dissim ilarity suggest either no relationship in the case o f RCA or weak similarity in the case o f net trade.
The lack o f change in trade structures shown in table two would indicate that the cross-country correlations have not changed much either in the 1980s. This is generally true - the differences in correlations between 1980 and 1987 are small. For each table there are fifteen correlations.
W e can summarise the changes over the 1980s as follows: for export distributions across countries, 10 correlations fell, five rose; for intra-industry trade, 9 fell, 6 rose; for RCA, eight fell, seven rose; and for net trade, 11 fell, 3 rose and one stayed constant. O verall, then, a picture o f lack of similarity, except in export structures, and o f m ild divergence rather than convergence between 1980 and 1987.
Technology and Trade Structure
In this section, we continue to analyse the relative structure and perform ance o f these six eco
nomies but considering this now by technology group. W e split our 80 industries into three groups o f high, medium and low technology, following the O E C D ’s categorisation (OECD 1986). The appropriate way to categorise industries with respect to innovation is a subject o f much debate and there is no doubt that the use o f R&D intensities as employed by the OECD is only a rough measure. However, for our purposes o f cross-country comparison o f general patterns and trends, it will suffice (see appendix for further details o f the classification).
With respect to technology and competitiveness, one frequently encountered argum ent is that the advanced economies must shift increasingly into high technology groups both as these are fast growing groups and as they will face increasing com petition in less technology intensive groups. Table seven gives some evidence relevant to the form er hypothesis showing the changing importance o f high, m edium and low technology exports in a country’s total exports.
In all countries the share o f high technology exports in total exports has increased - m ost strongly in the US and Japan and least in the case of Germany. In m edium technology exports Germany and Japan show an increase, the US a large fall and the UK, France and Italy sm aller declines.
In low technology exports, all countries exhibit a fall, which is m arked in the case o f Japan but otherwise relatively small.
In all economies except Italy, m edium technology exports constitute the largest share. Italy has fifty per cent o f its exports in low technology, despite which it has superior trends in its trade performance over the 1980s relative to the US, UK and France, suggesting any simple high technology/high competitiveness story is not appropriate. The highest shares o f exports in high technology are the US, followed by Japan and then the UK. Thus, the two economies with the worst deterioration in trade performance over the 1980s have nevertheless a strong emphasis on high technology. The EC four’s distribution is markedly different from that o f the US and Japan. However, the difference is in high and low technology shares and not in m edium tech
nology. The most m arked shift in distribution o f all the six economies over the period is Japan which shifts strongly out o f low technology and into high technology. The US position is also interesting as its shift into high technology at a time o f a fall in its share o f total OECD exports is more at the expense o f m edium than low technology exports. Given the increase in the value of the dollar to 1985 this would suggest that the m edium and low technology groups are more sensitive to exchange rate changes than the high technology group.
Table eight looks more directly at relative competitiveness in the three technology groups, comparing OECD export shares in each.
In high technology shares Italy and France are roughly constant, Germany, the U K and US show a fall, and Japan a rise. Again the EC shares fall to 1984 but recover som ewhat by 1987. The US and U K exhibit the largest declines. This is true also for share o f m edium technology exports.
Japan and Germany show a rise, Italy is constant and France a decline. In both high and medium technology, the share o f the EC4 is considerably greater than the separate shares o f either the US or Japan, particularly so in m edium technology due to the German contribution. Each o f the EC four except the U K have higher export shares in low technology than either the US or Japan;
the highest joint export share o f the EC four is, though, in m edium technology. The US, Japan and the UK each have better perform ance in high technology products than in their overall performance. Germany performs better than its average in m edium technology and France and Italy perform better than their average in low technology. These statistics again do not support any simplistic link between trade perform ance and technology. The overall trends in trade perform ance o f these six economies in our time period can be ranked in descending order as follows: Japan, Germany, Italy, France, UK, US. This could support arguments for specialising in high, m edium or low technology.
Table nine presents a further indicator o f competitiveness, the net trade balance o f each tech
nology group for each country. This gives a different picture to table eight. All countries except Italy have a negative net trade balance in low technology products and this is their worse trade balance. Only Japan and Germany have positive trade balances in high technology products.
German perform ance is better though in m edium technology as is France. U K perform ance is the same in medium and high technology and the US and Japan have better perform ance in high technology. Japan is the only country whose perform ance in high technology improves. In m edium technology only Germany and Japan show an improvement; in low technology, G er
many and Italy show an improvement. No country shows an im provem ent in all three categories and again the three better performers in terms o f overall trends, have their best perform ance in different categories: Japan in high technology, Germany in m edium technology and Italy in low technology. The US and UK experience the largest deterioration in their m edium technology trade balance and France in its low technology trade balance.
Overall these results present a very m ixed picture o f the competitiveness o f these economies which varies over time, across countries, and across technology group.
Overall, Japan and the US represent the two extremes o f trade perform ance over the time period.
Germany is the only economy to resemble Japan in showing some im provem ent in its trade performance and this acts to some degree to offset the im pact o f poor U K perform ance on the performance o f the EC4 as a whole. France and Italy come between Germany and the UK, showing weakly deteriorating performance. On such a summary one way to partition this ranking
o f countries would be in three groups - Japan and Germany, France and Italy, and the US and UK. Certainly, there is no tendency for the data to fall into two categories o f Japan and the US on the one hand and the EC4 on the other, nor do the EC4 form an obvious grouping.
Relative Competitiveness by Technology Group
In order to present a clearer picture o f the level and trends in relative com petitiveness across the three technology groups, we construct two measures o f relative perform ance - relative exports and relative net trade for each technology group, for each country relative first to the US and second to Japan. W e measure relative exports as:
Xt j / Xt k (4) RX . = ---
J x j / x k k 3
where
t = t e c h n o l o g y g r o u p - h i g h , m ed iu m o r lo w j = J a p a n , US, G e rm a n y , F i a n c e , UK o r I t a l y k = J a p a n o r US
and relative net trade as:
(X t j / Mt j ) / ( X t k /M t k )
(5) R N T ,. = X # j
/ (Xk /M k )
W here a country performs relatively better in a technology class than overall relative to Japan or the US the index will be greater than one. The index thus belongs in the general class o f revealed comparative advantage indices - here the comparison is with specific countries and for specific commodity groupings.
The results are summarised in figures 1-12. Figures 1 -4 present the high technology comparisons, figures 5-8 the m edium technology comparisons and 9-12 the low technology comparisons. The levels and trends indicated by the two measures - relative exports and relative net trade - are quite similar. Contrary to what m ight have been predicted given the stress on poor european performance in high technology industries, there are not strong trends in relative competitiveness in high technology industries relative to the US or Japan - most countries exhibit a decline relative to Japan comparing 1987 to 1980 but it is small. All four EC countries always have
values o f the indices less than one in high technology relative to Japan and to the US. Relative to the US, both the UK and France either maintain or slightly increase their competitiveness over the period, and Japan increases most strongly.
Stronger trends are found in m edium technology with respect to the US, and in low technology with respect to Japan. All five countries increase their indices in m edium technology relative to the US over the period and all have values greater than one by 1987 except for Italy. Relative to Japan all decline in m edium technology, but only weakly; all except Germ any have indices less than one. In low technology, there are no strong trends relative to the US except for Japan which is losing competitiveness. Relative to Japan, all countries show a sharp and continuing increase in relative competitiveness in low technology products. All the EC four have indices greater than one in all cases, and the US is also greater than one in net trade and in exports by 1987.
The m ost striking trends in relative competitiveness during the 1980s are thus the fall in US competitiveness in medium technology industries and the fall in relative Japanese com petiti
veness in low technology products. In contrast, the trends in high technology competitiveness are slight. The shift in the Japanese position is not surprising given the data presented above showing the shift out o f low technology exports by Japanese firms. The reasons why US competitiveness should have deteriorated most in m edium technology industries is less clear.
A partial explanation m ight be the potential effects o f the the US exchange rate over the period - whether the high level o f the dollar in the early 1980s had more dam aging effects on medium technology markets which would include many consum er goods where a wide range o f sub
stitutes exist.
Conclusion
This paper has analysed the structure and trends in competitiveness o f the leading OECD economies in the 1980s focusing in particular on the trends by technology group. The results question many traditional assumptions. Thus, although the six econom ies are sim ilar in their pattern o f exports, they vary widely in their patterns o f competitiveness. Furtherm ore, there is no support either in terms o f structure o f trade o r patterns o f competitiveness for the view that the EC economies are more sim ilar to each other than to the US or Japan. In terms o f structure, Italy is the most distinctive. In terms o f perform ance, the economies can be ranked as follows:
Japan, Germany, Italy, France, the UK and the US, again not supporting a distinctive EC versus US versus Japan classification.
With respect to technology groupings, all countries show a shift towards high technology exports but medium technology exports remain the largest except in the case o f Italy. Considering each country separately and comparing their performance across technology groups, the US, UK and Japan perform better in the high technology group, Germany in the m edium technology group, and Italy and France perform better than their average in the low technology group. A similar but not identical picture is found comparing competitiveness relative to the US and Japan o f each technology group relative to total trade. Germany is relatively strong compared to the US and Japan in m edium technology; the UK, France and Italy are relatively strong in low tech
nology. The US ’s competitiveness is relatively high in high technology products; Japan in high and medium technology. Over the period, the strongest trends observed are a decline in relative US competitiveness in m edium technology industries and a decline for Japan in low technology industries. The trends in high technology performance are w eak with Japan showing some improvement.
Overall, these results suggest the level and trends in trade structure and perform ance o f these economies are varied and that any analysis o f the causes o f these structures and perform ance or o f policy options m ust address this variety - its determinants and its implications.
References
Archibugi,D. and Pianta,M. (1990) "The technological specialisation o f the EEC, the US and Japan: evidence from patent data" mimeo
Buigues, P., Ilzkovitz, F., and Lebrun, J-F. (1990) "The Im pact o f the Internal M arket by Industrial Sector: the challenge for the member states" European Econom y -Social Europe special editition.
ECC1988) European Econom y no.35 "The Economics o f 1992"
Neven,D. (1990) "EEC integration towards 1992: some distributional aspects" Econom ic Policy no. 10
OECD (1986) "R&D, Invention and Competitiveness" Science and Technology Indicators no.2
Smith,A. and Venables,A. (1988) "Completing the internal m arket in the European Commu- nity:some industry simulations" European Economic Review
Appendix
The data employed in this study is 4-digit export and import data on the International Standard Industrial Classification giving a disaggregation level o f 80 manufacturing industries. The data is annual from 1980 to 1987 and was obtained from the OECD com puter databank. The clas
sification by technology group was carried out using the O EC D ’s classification o f high, m edium and low technology industries (OECD 1986). The O EC D ’s classification is by a mixture o f 2- and 3-digit industries. For this paper, we extended the groupings to 4-digit. The ISIC classes for each group are given below.
High Technology group
3522 3825 3831 3832 3833 3839 3845 3851 3852 3853
M edium technology group
3511 3720
3512 3821
3513 3822
3521 3823
3523 3824
3529 3829
3540 3842
3551 3843
3559 3844
3560 3849
Low technology 3111
3112 3114 3116 3118 3121 3131 3133 3140 3212 3214 3219 3231 3233 3311 3319 3411 3419 3530 3620 3692 3710 3812 3819 3901
group 3113 3115 3117 3119 3122 3132 3134 3211 3213 3215 3220 3232 3240 3312 3320 3412 3420 3610 3691 3699 3811 3813 3841 3902 3903
Y e a r F r a n c e G e r m a n y I t a l y U.K. E C 4 J a p a n U.S.
198 0 9.5 16.9 7.1 8.9 42. 4 11 . 9 15 . 3
1984 8.0 15.3 6.9 6.8 37.0 16 . 1 15 . 8
198 7 8.4 18.2 7.4 7.2 41 . 2 1 4 . 7 12 . 7
S o u r c e : S e e A p p e n d i x
T a c r e 2 :
C o r r e l a t i o n f o r E a c h C o u n t r y o f E x p o r t s , 1 9 8 0 - 1 9 8 7 , N e t T r a d e , 1 9 8 0 - 1 9 8 7 ,
R e v e a l e d C o m p a r a t i v e A d v a n t a g e (RCA) 1 9 8 0 - 1 9 8 7 , a n d I n t r a - i n d u s t r y T r a d e (IIT) 1 9 8 0 - 1 9 8 7
F r a n c e G e rm a n y I t a l y U .K . EC4 J a p a n U . S . E x p o r t s 0 . 9 6 0 . 9 7 0 . 9 5 0 . 9 0 0 . 9 8 0 . 9 4 0 . 9 3 N e t T r a d e
B a l a n c e 0 . 9 3 0 . 9 6 0 . 9 5 0 . 8 3 0 . 9 5 0 . 9 3 0 . 8 3
RCA 0 . 9 6 0 . 9 1 0 . 9 6 0 . 9 0 0 . 9 4 0 . 9 1 0 . 8 9
I I T 0 . 8 4 0 . 8 8 0 . 8 8 0 . 6 5 0 . 3 7 0 . 7 7 0 . 3 9
S o u r c e : S e e A p p e n d i x
T a b l e 3 : C o r r e l a t i o n o f E x p o r t P r o f i l e s 1 9 8 7
F r a n c e G e rm a n y I t a l y U .K . U .S . J a p a n F r a n c e 1 . 0
G e rm a n y 0 .94 1 . 0
I t a l y 0 . 6 9 0 . 7 2 1 . 0
U .K . 0 . S 4 0 . 7 9 0 . 6 9 1 . 0
U .S . 0 . 7 9 - 0 . 7 5 - 0 . 5 2 0 . 8 6 1 . 0
J a p a n 0 . 8 3 0 . 8 8 0 . 5 5 0 . 6 9 0 . 7 3 1 . 0
S o u r c e : S e e A p p e n d i x
T a b l e 4 : C o r r e l a t i o n o f I n t r a - i n d u s t r y T r a d e 1 9 8 7
F r a n c e G e r m a n y I t a l y U.K. U.S. J a p a n
F r a n c e 1.0
G e r m a n y 0.23 1.0
I t a l y 0.20 0.09 1.0
U.K. 0. 4 7 0.18 0.25 1.0
U.S. 0.3 5 -0.03 - 0 . 3 0 0.28 1.0
J a p a n 0.12 0. 2 5 0 . 0 8 0.26 0. 1 4 1.0
S o u r c e : S e e A p p e n d i x
T a b l e 5 :
C o r r e l a t i o n o f R e v e a l e d C o m p a r a t i v e A d v a n t a g e P r o f i l e s 1 9 8 7
F r a n c e G e r m a n y I t a l y U.K. U.S. J a p a n
F r a n c e 1.0
G e r m a n y - 0 . 1 7 1.0
I t a l y 0.0 1 0.0 3 1.0
U.K. 0.1 4 - 0 . 1 4 - 0 . 1 4 1.0
U.S. - 0 . 2 1 - 0 . 0 4 - 0 . 3 4 0 . 0 9 1.0
J a p a n - 0 . 2 4 - 0 . 0 1 - 0 . 1 4 - 0 . 1 5 - 0 . 0 9 1.0
S o u r c e : S e e A p p e n d i x
C o r r e l a t i o n o f N e t T r a d e B a l a n c e s 1 9 8 7 T a b l e 6 :
F r a n c e G e r m a n y I t a l y U.K. U.S. J a p a n
F r a n c e 1.0
G e r m a n y 0.23 1.0
I t a l y - 0 . 1 0 0 . 0 2 1.0
U.K. 0.22 0 . 4 8 - 0 . 0 3 1.0
U.S. 0. 0 1 0 . 4 8 - 0 . 3 8 0.43 1.0
J a p a n 0.02 0 . 5 7 0.2 8 0. 2 6 0 . 0 5 1.0
Source: See A p p e n d i x
T a b l e 7: D i s t r i b u t i o n o f E a c h C o u n t r y ' s E x p o r t s A c r o s s t h e T h r e e T e c h n o l o g y G r o u p s
Y e a r F r a n c e G e r m a n y I t a l y U.K. EC4 J a p a n U.S.
H i g h T e c h n o l o g y
198 0 14.3 16.2 1 0 . 8 21. 2 15. 9 24. 7 2 7 . 5
198 4 18. 5 18.0 12 . 3 26. 2 1 8 . 5 32.4 34.5
198 7 20. 0 18.4 1 3 . 1 26.3 19. 2 34. 5 38. 2
M e d i u m T e c h n o l o g y
198 0 43.3 52.4 38 . 1 42.9 4 6 . 0 45.9 4 7 . 0
198 4 41. 1 52.2 35 . 6 4 0 . 1 4 4 . 5 43.3 4 2 . 9
1 9 8 7 43. 1 53.8 37.4 40. 1 46. 4 48. 2 39. 9
L o w T e c h n o l o g y
198 0 42.4 31.4 5 1 . 1 35.9 38. 1 29 . 4 25 . 5
198 4 4 0 . 5 29.8 5 2 . 1 33.7 37. 0 24.3 22 . 6
1 9 8 7 36.9 27.8 4 9 . 5 33.1 3 4 . 5 17.3 21 . 9
S o u r c e : S e e A p p e n d i x
O E C D E x p o r t S h a r e s T a b l e 8 :
Y e a r F r a n c e G e r m a n y I t a l y U.K. E C 4 J a p a n U.S.
H i g h T e c h n o l o g y
1980 7.8 15.6 4.4 10.9 38 . 6 16.9 24 . 1
1984 7.0 12.9 4.0 8.3 32 . 1 24.4 25 . 5
19 8 7 7.5 14.9 4.3 8.5 35.3 22.7 21 . 8
M e d i u m T e c h n o l o g y
1980 9.6 20.6 6.4 9.0 4 5 . 5 12.8 1 6 . 8
1984 7.8 19.0 5.8 6.5 39.2 16.6 1 6 . 1
198 7 8.3 22.4 6.4 6.7 43. 7 16.2 1 1 . 6
L o w T e c h n o l o g y
1980 1 0 . 1 13.4 9.2 8.1 4 0 . 8 8.9 9.8
1984 8.9 12.4 9.8 6.2 37.3 10.6 9.7
19 8 7 9.1 14.8 10. 8 7.0 41 . 7 7.5 8.2
S o u r c e : S e e A p p e n d i x
Y e a r F r a n c e G e r m a n y I t a l y U.K. E C 4 J a p a n u.s.
H i g h T e c h n o l o g y
1980 0 . 0 1 0.1 4 - 0 . 0 8 0 . 0 7 0 . 0 7 0.6 2 0 . 2 5
1984 0.0 6 0.12 - 0 . 0 5 - 0 . 0 4 0 . 0 4 0.7 0 - 0 . 0 3
1987 - 0 . 0 2 0.1 1 - 0 . 1 3 - 0 . 0 4 0 . 0 1 0 . 6 7 - 0 . 0 7 M e d i u m T e c h n o l o g y
6 1 9 8 0 0.0 8 0. 3 9 0 . 0 6 0.1 3 0 . 2 1 0.6 1 0 . 1 0
1984 0 . 1 0 0. 4 0 0 . 1 1 - 0 . 0 3 0 . 2 0 0.64 - 0 . 1 8
1987 0 . 0 2 0. 4 0 0 . 0 5 - 0 . 0 4 0 . 1 8 0.6 4 - 0 . 2 9
L o w T e c h n o l o g y
1980 0 . 0 0 - 0 . 1 1 0 . 1 3 - 0 . 1 1 - 0 . 0 3 0.1 8 - 0 . 2 6 1984 0 . 0 0 - 0 . 0 8 0 . 1 8 - 0 . 2 2 - 0 . 0 3 0.1 9 - 0 . 4 9
1987 - 0 . 0 7 - 0 . 0 4 0 . 1 7 - 0 . 1 9 - 0 . 0 3 - 0 . 0 4 - 0 . 5 0
S o u r c e : S e e A p p e n d i x
Expons relative to the US in high technology relative to all sectors
Relative
Exports Relative
Exports
FZGQRS tbxxe
Net trade ratio relative to the l)S in high technology relative to all sectors
r z c o u FOOT
Relative Exports
Relative Exports
PZGQHE S E V B i
PZ G O U EIGHT
Net traae ratio relative to the US in i medium technology relative to all sectors j
Relative Net Trade
F IG U R E TW ELVE
T r a d e S t r u c t u r e a n d C o m p e t i t i v e n e s s i n t h e H a i n O E C D E c o n o m i e s ,
D i s c u s s i o n P a p e r FS I V 91 - 2, W i s s e n s c h a f t s z e n t r u m B e r l i n f ü r S o z i a l f o r s c h u n g 1991.
