The Impact Of Foreign Trade On Employment In The Industrial Sector

China’s export volume ranked first in the world, import volume second. As a pillar industry in China, industrials produced 38.47% of the whole national GDP in 2012, with a 40.6% of contribution. What’s more, foreign trade generated by industrials has played an important role in domestic employment, especially among those labor-intensive industries. Therefore, in the context of the oversupply of labor force, it is of considerable significance to study the impact foreign trade has upon the employment among industrials.This paper employs the input-output method to analyze the impact foreign trade has upon the employment among industrials. Data of year 1992,1995,1997,2002,2005,2007 and 2010 in this paper were extracted from 21 industrial industries. Based the equation of "export (import)-induce (substitute)-employment coefficient= export (import)-induce (substitute)-production coefficient* comprehensive employment coefficient", this paper analyzes in detail the characteristic of export, import and net export horizontally and vertically.Results are as follows. Firstly, it is more comprehensive to take into consideration mutual effects of input and output among industries. Secondly, export and import play a different role in employment among industrials. Industries like communication or other electronic equipment manufacturing, and chemicals, have higher export (import)-induce (substitute)-employment coefficients. The textile industry has a higher export-induce-employment coefficient, and the higher import-substitute-employment coefficient indicates that China has an import demand of high-end textile raw materials and some textile machinery. Thirdly, each industry impacts domestic employment in their own unique way. Among labor intensive industries, textile and apparel industries have higher export-induce-employment coefficients, export-induce-production coefficients and comprehensive employment coefficients; among capital intensive industries, higher export-induce-employment coefficients of chemicals, metal product industry, electric machinery and equipment manufacturing give credit to their high comprehensive employment coefficients. Fourthly, the employment-inducing effect is declining year by year.Given the above analysis, this paper puts forward its policy implications to promote domestic employment. First, this country should expand its export of textile, apparel, communication or other electronic equipment manufacturing industries, and chemicals; meanwhile, it should reduce the import of textile, chemicals and equipment manufacturing industries. Second, China shall encourage the transformation of labor intensive industries to consumer-orientation, and support the combination of high-tech and large labor force. Finally, China shall energetically develop its third industry.