PUBLICATIONS & REPORTS
PUBLICATIONS & REPORTS
From Kitakyushu to the world: AGI, a research institute that studies Asia's economy and society
Economic Downturns and Foreign Multinationals in Asian Manufacturing
| Author | Eric D.Ramstetter, Shahrazat Binti Haji Ahmad |
|---|---|
| Date of Publication | 2010. 3 |
| No. | 2010-04 |
| Download | 324KB |
Contents Introduction
This paper first examines trends in the shares of foreign-owned multinational corporations (MNCs) in the manufacturing industries of eight relatively large Asian larger economies, Japan, Hong Kong, China, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, and Vietnam. It focuses on four periods of economic slowdown surrounding 1985, 1998, 2001, and 2009 but finds no clear, consistent trends in MNC shares during these periods. Likewise, the paper also compares trends in performance differentials between MNCs and local firms or plants. MNCs do tend to be larger, have higher productivity, wages, and export propensities, but it seems very difficult to attribute trends in these differentials to cyclical factors, such as economic downturns, rather than other medium- to long-term factors that also influence investment and production decisions in MNCs and other Asian firms.