Research On Total Factor Productivity And Export Choice Of Chinese Manufacturing Enterprises

"New" new trade theory is the forefront of current international trade theory.The classic model proposed by Melitz(2003),who is the representative of the theory,has got an important inference: Since enterprises need to pay a higher fixed cost to enter the international market,only high-productivity enterprises can afford it.Therefore,only highproductivity enterprises can choose to export,and low-productivity enterprises can only be sold domestically..This inference is valued by domestic scholars and is generally known as the "self-selection effect." Chinese scholars have done a lot of verification on whether there is a “self-selection effect” on Chinese enterprises' exports.Some scholars have found that the productivity of Chinese export enterprises is lower than that of non-export enterprises.There is no “self-selection effect” in enterprise exports.China's export phenomenon violates the basic theory of Melitz(2003)and calls this phenomenon a “productivity paradox.” Research that supports productivity paradox usually uses labor productivity or approximate total factor productivity as a measure of firm productivity.Other scholars' research shows that the productivity of export enterprises is significantly higher than that of non-export enterprises,supporting the “self-selection effect” of enterprise exports.These scholars usually use the semi-parametric estimation method to estimate the total factor productivity of enterprises.Different methods of calculating total factor productivity have a certain impact on the results of verification.This paper uses the total factor productivity indicator to measure the productivity of the enterprise,and uses the OP method,the LP method,and the ACF method to calculate the total factor productivity.In terms of data,this paper uses the 1998-2013 China Industrial Enterprise Database to screen out the manufacturing samples and process them to obtain an unbalanced panel with more than 3 million observations.In theory,based on Melitz's(2003)theory of enterprise heterogeneity,this paper combines China's actual situation,changes the assumption that different enterprises face the same fixed cost of export,and assumes that there is market segmentation in the domestic market,and enterprises entering the domestic market also face fixed costs.On this basis,the paper analyzes the impact of enterprise total factor productivity on export choice and the influence of foreign capital attribute,capital intensity and export density on the “self-selection effect” of enterprise export.According to the theoretical and empirical results,the paper draws the following conclusions:(1)Overall,there is a “self-selection effect” in the export of manufacturing enterprises,that is,there is indeed a “total factor productivity threshold” in the export of manufacturing enterprises,and only companies with high total factor productivity can export.This is consistent with the reasoning of the Melitz basic model.(2)There is a “productivity paradox” in the export of foreign companies,and “self-selection effect” in the export of non-foreign holding companies.(3)“Productivity paradox” exists in the export of laborintensive enterprises.There is a “self-selection effect” in the export of capital-intensive industries.(4)There is a “self-selection effect” in the export of general trade enterprises,and “productivity paradox” exists in the export of processing trade enterprises.