Export activities and the demand for skills in German businesses

This analysis deals with the influence of export activities on demand for workers of differing skill levels. Previous literature suggests that productivity of export firms can improve as a result of the lessons learned from experience in international markets and/or that such productivity may be higher from the get-go by virtue of the self-selection effect among firms involved in export activities. Engaging in export activities may potentially lead to changes in employment structure, with a greater tendency to employ more highly skilled workers. To investigate this hypothesis, we applied a conditional difference-in-difference regression model of labor demand for three different skill levels. The data we used for our work was taken from the German IAB Establishment Panel covering the period from 2000 to 2017. Our results show not only the need to control for self-selection into export activity but also that changes in employment patterns appear to be skill-biased among manufacturing firms starting out in export activities. Nevertheless, corresponding findings for firms that have ceased exporting are conspicuous by their absence. Businesses in the service sector that decide to cease exporting appear to shed workers across all skill levels.