Maria Bas

Sciences Po Paris | IEP · Département d’économie

The income share of the top 1% of earners in the USA increased to 20% in 2014. The increase in income inequalities is contemporaneous with the rising market concentration across industries. This article shows that both developments are linked: top executives in more concentrated markets receive more pay than those in less concentrated markets. Supe...

We examine which product supply-side characteristics affect the resilience of traded products to the COVID-19 pandemic. Relying on monthly product-level exports by all countries to the United States, Japan, and 27 European Union countries from January 2018 to December 2020, we estimate a difference-in-differences specification for the impact of COV...

This paper disentangles the impacts of trade liberalization on firm market and production decisions. Using firm-product data for Ecuador, we exploit exogenous tariff changes at entry to the World Trade Organization and find positive effects of trade liberalization on revenue total factor productivity (TFP-R). Input-trade liberalization improves fir...

This paper tests for the production complementarity between firms' access to high-quality intermediate inputs and their skill composition and their joint impact on output quality. Using census data at firm-product level for Ecuador for 1997–2007, we exploit exogenous tariff changes at Ecuador's entry to the World Trade Organization to show that inp...

This paper investigates the heterogeneous effect of financial development on firm‐level growth. Our analysis relies on the experience of the rapid expansion of credit in Indian states, following the process of banking reforms in the early 1990s. Based on a survey of Indian manufacturing firms (1997–2006), we examine how changes in the access to fin...

This paper investigates the unequal impact of trade liberalization on firms' product scope and innovation depending on firms' heterogeneous productivity and markups. Motivated by a simple theoretical framework of international trade, firm heterogeneity and variable markups, our analysis builds on Ecuador's exogenous trade liberalization with its ac...

This paper investigates untested predictions from trade models with heterogeneous firms and endogenous input-and output-quality choices. We study input-trade liberalization's impact on access to high-quality imported intermediate inputs and consequent impacts on output quality and implications on firms' demand for skills. Using census data at firm-...

In a developing country, trade liberalization affects firms’ production choices through different channels: intensification of foreign competition, reductions of production factor costs, and enhanced access to foreign consumers and technology. Using firm-level data from India, we investigate how firms with different characteristics adjust their dom...

This paper studies the impact of input-trade liberalization on firms' decision to upgrade foreign technology embodied in imported capital goods. Our empirical analysis is motivated by a simple theoretical framework of endogenous technology adoption, heterogeneous firms and imported inputs. The model predicts a positive effect of input tariff reduct...

Based on a panel of 16 OECD countries and 10 manufacturing industries over 1996–2007, this paper investigates the impact of tariffs on foreign intermediate goods on productivity growth in downstream manufacturing industries. The results show that imposing tariffs on imported intermediate goods is particularly harmful for industries that operate clo...

We propose a trade model where heterogeneous firms decide on a productivity-enhancing technology investment. The model analyzes the impact of multilateral trade liberalization on firm- and industry-level productivity. Freer trade increases the incentives to invest in technology by raising export profits. It also dampens these incentives, however, a...

This paper explores the impact of input trade liberalization on imported input and exported product prices. Using Chinese transaction data for 2000-2006, we capture causal effects between exogenous input tariff reductions and within firm changes in HS6-traded product prices. For identification, we make use of a natural control group of firms that a...

This paper investigates the relationship between the reform of energy, telecommunications and transport services in India in the mid-1990s and manufacturing firms’ export performance. The empirical analysis relies on exogenous indicators of regulation of Indian services sectors and detailed firm-level data from India in the 1994–2004 period. I find...

This paper explores the heterogeneous productivity impact of trade, product market and financial market policies over the last decade in China. The paper makes a critical distinction between downstream and upstream industries, focusing on the indirect effects of regulation in upstream industries on firm performance in downstream manufacturing indus...

Following Melitz (2003)'s seminal paper, several theoretical and empirical studies have shown that only the subset of most productive firms export. While other studies provide evidence on a positive effect of an increase in imported inputs on firms' productivity, the link between imported intermediate inputs and export scope has not been made. This...

A unilateral trade reform generates two opposite effects: market access expansion and strengthening of competitive pressures in the liberalized market. Using detailed trade and firm-level data from France, we investigate how French firms' product scope and export sales changed after Chinese liberalization vis-à-vis Asian liberalization. Our finding...

Are financial constraints preventing firms from importing capital goods? Sourcing capital goods from foreign countries is costly and requires internal or external financial resources. A simple model of foreign technology adoption shows that credit constraints act as a barrier to importing capital goods under imperfect financial markets. In our stud...

This paper develops a model of trade that features heterogeneous firms, technology choice and different types of skilled labor in a general equilibrium framework to explain within‐industry increase in the relative demand for skilled workers. Its main contribution is to investigate the impact of firms' export and technology choice decisions on skill...

Trade openness contributes to the diffusion of the modern technologies embodied in imported intermediate goods, which play a central role in the economic growth of developing countries. This paper investigates the micro-economic effects of input-trade liberalization. Previous work has found positive effects of access to foreign inputs on firm perfo...

Recent findings in international trade using detailed firm level surveys emphasize the microeconomic effects of trade liberalization episodes. A unilateral trade reform has two opposite effects on firms’ export patterns: (i) expansion of export opportunities for foreign firms exporting to that destination and (ii) intensification of foreign competi...

Do firms that increase their access to finance are more likely to adopt foreign technology? Importing foreign capital goods is costly and requires to use internal or external financial resources. The benefits from foreign technology transfer may be heterogeneous across firms, if financial markets are imperfect. Credit constrains act thus as a barri...

Do variations in labor market institutions across countries affect the cross-border organization of the firm? Using firm-level data on multinationals located in France, we show that multinational firms are more likely to import intermediate inputs from external independent suppliers instead of importing from their own subsidiaries when importing fr...

Using bilateral trade flow data from 1979 to 1999, we estimate trade integration between Chile and its principal trading partners (European Union, United States and Latin America) during this period. Our estimates are based on a gravity specification, theoretically grounded on a monopolistic competition framework with increasing returns. Trade barr...

We investigate the effect of different channels through which input trade liberalization affects firms’ export decisions. We develop a trade model with heterogeneous firms and sectors of varying imported input intensity that reproduces different mechanisms through which the access to foreign inputs affects the performance of domestic firms. In indu...

This paper develops a trade model with heterogeneous firms introducing a fixed technology cost and different types of skilled labor. The main contribution is to explain the effects of trade integration on the extensive margin of technology adoption and its impact on wage inequalities. The originality of this paper is to combine skilled-biased techn...

This paper studies the impact of trade liberalization on technology adoption and its eect on wage inequalities. We develop a trade model with heterogeneous rms introducing a xed technology cost and dierent types of skilled labor. The contribution of this paper is to develop a possible explanation to the increase in the skill premium in developping...

The OECD journal on public sector budgeting, published three times per year. It draws on the best of the recent work of the OECD Working Party of Senior Budget Officials (SBO), as well as special contributions from finance ministries, and makes it available to a wider community in an accessible format. The journal provides insight on leading-edge i...

We study the impact of trade on productivity using Chilean plant-level data (1982-1999). Our contribution is to disentangle the impact of export and import barriers. Firstly, we estimate the production functions to obtain plant TFP. Secondly, we estimate trade barriers (border effects) between Chile and its trading partners at the industry level an...

Using bilateral trade flow data from 1979 to 1999, we estimate trade integration between Chile and its principal trading partners during the period (European Union, United States and Latin America). Our estimates are based on a gravity specification, theoretically grounded on a monopolistic competition framework with increasing returns. Trade barri...

This paper studies the impact of trade reforms on the evolution of plant's productivity in Chile (1979-2000). The main contribution of the paper is to construct detailed measures of trade liberalization disentangling the impact of export and import oriented policies. We find evidence of a positive impact of export oriented policies on productivity...

This article provides a snapshot of the status of budgetary institutions, procedures and practices in Latin American countries based on the results of the OECD 2006 budget survey. Particular elements include: the legal framework and role of the legislature; fiscal rules; medium-term expenditure frameworks; performance information; and budget transp...

This paper develops an intra-industry model of trade with heterogeneous firms to investigate the impact of trade on the evolution of within firm productivity. The main contribution is to incorporate endogenous labor productivity gains. Heterogeneous firms have different incentives to invest in foreign technology which in turns enhances efficiency h...

This paper develops a dynamic inter-industry model of trade with heterogeneous sectors to analyze the impact of trade liberalization on the pattern of export specialization. Our model extends the work of Melitz (2003), incorporating endogenous labor productivity gains determined by investment in imported capital goods. Sectors are dierentiated

Does financial liberalization affect firms' decision to import capital goods? Sourcing capital goods from foreign countries is costly and requires internal or external financial resources. This paper investigates how financial reforms, through easing firms' credit constraints, affect the decision to upgrade foreign capital goods. A simple model of...