Abstract

This study examines the relationship between exporting, importing, and firm performance using a firm-level panel data set from the Manufacturing Industry Survey of Thailand from 1999 to 2003. We mainly divide our analysis into three parts. First, we evaluate export and import premia for different measures of firm performance such as employment, value added per worker, capital per worker, average wages, and sales. Second, we test for export and import premia by running regressions of different performance measures on export and import status using probit and logit models to compare results. Third, we examine whether exporting and importing activities improve productivity at the firm level. The results reveal that, on average, exporters and importers are more productive, more capital-intensive, have more employees and total sales, and pay higher average wages than those of domestic counterparts. By various measures, exporters tend to be the most productive group of firms, followed by importers, and then firms that do not trade internationally. The results suggest that there might be a strong positive correlation between exporting and productivity and a weak positive correlation between importing and productivity at the firm level in Thai manufacturing.

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