Factor Intensity, Product Switching, and Productivity: Evidence
from Chinese Exporters
Yue May
Lingnan University

Heiwai Tangz
Tufts University

Yifan Zhangx
Lingnan University

October, 2012

Abstract
This paper analyzes how a …rm’s specialization in its core products after exporting a¤ects
its factor intensity and productivity. Using Chinese manufacturing …rm data over the period of
1998-2007, we …nd that …rms become less capital-intensive but more productive after exporting,compared to non-exporters that share similar ex ante characteristics. To rationalize these …ndings that contrast with existing studies, we develop a variant of the model by Bernard, Redding,and Schott (2010, 2011) to consider …rms producing multiple products with varying capitalintensity. The model predicts that when a …rm in a labor-abundant country starts exporting,it specializes in its core competencies by allocating more resources to produce labor-intensive
products. Firm ex ante productivity is associated with a smaller decline in capital intensity
after exporting. A sharper post-exporting decline in capital intensity is associated with a larger
increase in measured total factor productivity. We …nd …rm-level evidence supporting thesepredictions. Using transaction-level data for the period over 2000-2006, we …nd that Chinese
exporters continuously add new products that are less capital-intensive than their existing products and drop those that are more capital-intensive.
Key Words Exporters, Productivity, Factor Intensity, Multi-product Firms
JEL Classi…cation Numbers: F11, L16, O53
We would like to thank Daniel Berkowitz, Loren Brandt, Chang-Tai Hsieh, Amit Khandelwal, Steven Klepper,
Alexis Leon, Soiliou Namoro, Marc Muendler, Albert Park, Veronica Rappaport, Thomas Rawski, Stephen Redding,Peter Schott, Robert Staiger, Jo Van Biesebroeck and seminar participants at the Berkeley-Booth-IGC China Summer
Institute 2011, Clemson, IFPRI, Johns Hopkins SAIS, LSE, NBER ITI Meetings, Penn-State-Tsinghua Conference,
World Bank, and UIUC, for their helpful comments and discussions. The authors gratefully acknowledge funding from
Competitive Earmarked Research Grant (LU3409/06H) of the RGC of HKSAR Government and Direct Allocation
Grant of Lingnan University (funding # DR07B4). The usual disclaimer applies.
yyuema@ln.edu.hk.
zheiwai.tang@tufts.edu.
xyifan.zhang@ln.edu.hk.

1

1

Introduction

A large body of research has documented the superior performance of exporters relative to nonexporters. Exporters are found to be larger, more productive, more capital- and skill-intensive(e.g. Bernard and Jensen, 1999). Existing explanations for exporters’ superior performance canbe categorized into three broad themes, namely self-selection (e.g., Clerides et al., 1998; Bernard
et al., 2003; Melitz, 2003), learning by exporting (e.g., Aw et al., 2000; Van Biesebroeck, 2005; De
Loecker, 2007), and …rms’ investment or skill upgrading in preparation to export (e.g., Bernard
and Jensen, 1997; Yeaple, 2005; Lileeva and Tre‡er, 2010; Bustos, 2011; Aw et al., 2011; Iacovone
and Javorcik, 2012).
This paper studies a lesser known e¤ect of exporting on …rm performance –how a …rm’s specialization in its core products after exporting a¤ects its factor intensity and thus productivity. Usinga large panel data set of China’s manufacturing …rms over the 1998-2007 period, we …nd that …rms’
measured productivity increases but capital intensity declines after exporting. Figures 1 (unbalanced panel) and 2 (balanced panel) show that exporters’average capital intensity was persistently
lower than that of non-exporters in China from 1999 to 2007. Figure 3 shows the kernel densities
of capital intensity for both types of …rms in 2007, after demeaning the …rm measures from theindustry averages. It shows that exporters are less capital-intensive in a distribution sense. We
systematically con…rm that these patterns are observed within …rms and within a narrowly de…ned
industry. To address the bias due to …rms’selection into exporting, we use the matched samplingtechniques to compare exporters and non-exporters with similar ex ante observable characteristics(i.e., Heckman, Ichimura, and Todd, 1997 and the subsequent studies). By comparing ex post
characteristics of exporters and the matched non-exporters within the same bins based on ex ante
productivity, capital intensity, and sales, we continue to …nd results consistent with Figures 1-3.
Should we be surprised about these results? Perhaps we should if we compare our results withthe existing evidence about the superior performance of exporters relative to non-exporters (e.g.,
Bernard and Wagner, 1997; Bernard and Jensen, 2004; Van Biesebroeck, 2005; and De Loecker,2007). On the other hand, our results serve as a “mirror image”of the …ndings by Bernard, Jensen,
and Schott (2006), who …nd that US manufacturing …rms in sectors facing more import competition
from low-wage countries are more likely to switch industries and become more skill and capitalintensive over time. We …nd that …rms in China, a large low-wage country, exhibit the opposite
pattern in capital intensity when they start exporting. During the sample period when Chinese
exports surged, we …nd that their exporters exploited the country’s comparative advantage by
consistently maintaining a lower capital intensity than non-exporters. These …ndings, which can beviewed as the Heckscher-Ohlin e¤ ects within …rms, have important implications for understanding2the impact of trade on the factor markets in developing countries and their trade partners.1
What accounts for the fact that …rms become less capital-intensive after exporting? To answer
this question, we develop a variant of the multi-product model by Bernard, Redding, and Schott(2010, 2011) (BRS hereafter) to consider both capital and labor as factors of production. In themodel, heterogeneous …rms can potentially produce a continuum of products, for which productiondi¤ers in capital intensity. Besides …rm heterogeneity in productivity (“ability”) as in Melitz (2003),
a …rm’s pro…tability of selling a product in a foreign market depends on a set of exogenous …rmproduct “consumer taste”attributes. In addition to the country-speci…c …xed export cost, exportingan additional product entails extra …xed costs (e.g. R&D expenditure to produce a blue print oroverhead costs to manage a product-speci…c sales team). Thus, a …rm exports a product only if its
product attribute guarantees su¢ ciently high revenue to cover the extra …xed export cost. Given
China’s labor abundance, labor-intensive products are associated with lower zero-pro…t thresholds
than capital-intensive products for all …rms on average. When a …rm receives a favorable shock to
its …xed export cost so that it starts exporting (to a capital-abundant country), it will specialize
in its core competencies –the labor-intensive products. Thus, a …rm becomes more labor-intensive
after exporting either by expanding sales of existing labor-intensive products (the intensive margin)
or by adding the more labor-intensive products (the extensive margin).
Besides rationalizing the …ndings about exporters’lower capital intensity, our model yields two
additional predictions. First, it sheds light on how changes in product scope would a¤ect a …rm’s
measured TFP. In particular, …rms that have a larger reallocation of resources from capital-intensive
to labor-intensive products after exporting have a bigger increase in measured TFP. The reason
is that given …xed export costs and …rm productivity, an increase in the sales of labor-intensive
products implies a larger degree of increasing returns, relative to capital-intensive products. Second,
our model also predicts that the ex ante more productive exporters experience less product churningand have a smaller decline in capital intensity after exporting. We …nd supporting evidence for bothof these theoretical predictions using the …rm-level data. Although recent studies on multi-product…rms have made similar predictions, to the best of our knowledge, this paper is the …rst study
to provide empirical evidence on the impact of trade on …rm productivity through the proposed
product churning channel.2 Our …ndings provide a new angle to interpret the relation between
exporting and …rm productivity, both ex ante and ex post, in addition to the existing empirical1
Notice although Bernard, Redding, and Schott (2007) also incorporate a Heckscher-Ohlin framework with the
Melitz (2003) model, …rms only di¤er in terms of productivity but not factor intensity within an industry, which iswhat we focus on.
2
Bernard, Redding, and Schott (2010) and Mayer, Melitz, and Ottaviano (2012) theoretically show that specialization in core competencies can enhance measured …rm productivity. They do not provide direct empirical evidence
verifying these predictions.

3

studies that mainly focus on learning by exporting or selection.
To provide further evidence that product churning is the channel through which exporters
in labor-abundant countries can potentially become less capital-intensive after exporting, we use
transactions-level trade data. By merging the trade data with the manufacturing …rm data, weare able to compute the weighted average of capital intensity of each product (HS 6), based on
the capital intensity measures of the …rms producing the product. With the product-level capitalintensity measures, we investigate whether …rms’ product churning patterns are consistent with
our model predictions: …rms would specialize in labor-intensive products after exporting. Using
transaction-level data for the period over 2001-2006, we …nd that new exporters in China continuously add new products that are less capital-intensive than their existing products and drop thosethat are more capital-intensive. The added products tend to be even less capital-intensive if thedestination country is more capital-abundant.
The rest of the paper is organized as follows. Section 2 reviews the related literature. Section
3 describes our data source. Section 4 explores the basic patterns of export participation, capitalintensity, and productivity. Section 5 examines the impact of exporting on new exporters’capitalintensity. Section 6 presents a theoretical model to rationalize our …ndings. Sections 7 and 8
examine the speci…c theoretical predictions using transactions-level trade data. The last section
concludes.

2

Related Literature

Our paper relates to several strands of literature. First and foremost, it contributes to the growing
theoretical literature on multi-product exporters. A common feature of this literature is thatdiversi…cation across products is costly, and access to foreign markets provides an opportunity for…rms to specialize in their core competencies. Feenstra and Ma (2008) study how trade liberalization
reduces …rms’ product scope due to the presence of cannibalization e¤ects. Nocke and Yeaple(2008) study the implications when a …rm’s marginal cost of production increases in product scope
due to managers’ limited span of control as in Lucas (1978). Eckel and Neary (2010) examine
theoretically how exports can enhance …rm productivity when multi-product …rms specialize intheir core competencies, taking advantage of the larger market size. In their model, each …rm
has a core product that is associated with the lowest marginal cost. Producing a product farther
away from the …rm’s core product is increasingly more costly. Bernard, Redding, and Schott(2011) show theoretically that trade liberalization would result in both within and across-…rm
reallocation of resources, leading to growth in both …rm and aggregate productivity. The added4multi-product dimension permits …rms to drop products that are less appealing to the consumers
and add those that are more appealing upon trade liberalization, raising measured …rm productivity.
Using Brazilian …rm data, Arkolakis and Muendler (2011) document the within-…rm pattern ofspecialization in core competencies and rationalize the …ndings by multi-product model that features
local entry costs, which increase in the …rms’product scope. Mayer, Melitz, and Ottaviano (2012)
go further by showing the relation between destination market toughness and exporters’productmix. They show theoretically and empirically that …rms increase sales of the best-performing
products in tougher markets.
All these papers highlight the positive impact of exporting on …rm productivity through the
product churning channel, but do not provide direct empirical evidence supporting that. Using
the change in capital intensity after exporting to capture the degree of specialization, we provide
evidence on how product churning contributes to a higher measured …rm productivity. Moreover, we
extend the existing multi-product framework that largely focuses on a single factor of production
to consider both capital and labor as inputs, and empirically verify that specialization in corecompetencies (labor-intensive products for exporters in developing countries) is associated with ahigher observed …rm productivity.3
Second, our paper contributes to the extensive literature on the productivity e¤ects of exporting.
One strand of this literature hypothesizes that exporters can learn from foreign buyers about
product designs and advanced production technology (World Bank, 1993; De Loecker, 2007). Firmlevel empirical studies …nd mixed results for this learning-by-exporting hypothesis. Clerides, Lach,
and Tybout (1998) and Bernard and Jensen (1999) are among the …rst studies to empiricallydistinguish the causal impact of exporting on productivity and self-selection into exporting. They
…nd that exporters have higher productivity than non-exporters before exporting but not after.4
Other studies …nd more positive results (e.g., Wagner, 2002; Girma, Greenway, and Kneller, 2003;
Alvarez and Lopez, 2005; Van Biesebroeck, 2005; and De Loecker, 2007).5 On the other hand,3

In the appendix of Bernard, Redding, and Schott (2010), the authors extend the baseline model to consider
two factors of production. They further show how endogenous product choices upon export participation a¤ect …rm
measured productivity. They did not, however explicitly solve for how relative factor endowment of the exporting
country can serve as a source of within-…rm comparative advatange. Our later discussion on specialization in core
comptetence and productivity gains are developed on their argument.
4
Clerides, Lach, and Tybout (1998) use …rm-level from Colombia, Mexico, and Morocco for their study; while
Bernard and Jensen (1999) use …rm-level data from the U.S. Aw, Chung, and Roberts (2000) and Delgado, Farinas,
and Ruano (2002) come to the same conclusions for Taiwan, Korea, and Spain.
5
These studies include Wagner (2002) for Germany; Girma, Greenway, and Kneller (2003) for the United Kingdom;
Alvarez and Lopez (2005) for Chile; Van Biesebroeck (2005) for sub-Saharan African countries; and De Loecker (2007)
for Slovenia. A more recent study by a group of economists (International Study Group on Exports and Productivity,2008) uses comparable …rm panel data for 14 countries and an identical method to investigate the relationship between
exports and productivity. They …nd strong evidence for self-selection but no evidence for learning-by-exporting.
Speci…c to China, Kraay (1999) …nds that exporters are more productive than non-exporters based on survey dataover 2000 …rms. Park et al. (2007) use exposure to the 1997 Asian …nancial crisis as an instrument and …nd that5

recent studies focus on the …rms’ decisions to simultaneously invest in technology and export.
Among others, Lileeva and Tre‡er (2010) use the elimination of the U.S. tari¤s as an instrument
to predict Canadian …rms’ entry into the U.S. market, and show that access to foreign markets
enhances labor productivity and technology adoption for the less productive …rms. Similarly, Bustos(2011) …nd that Argentine …rms experiencing sharper tari¤ cuts in Brazil increase investment inprocess innovation more. Aw, Roberts, and Xu (2011) structurally estimate a dynamic model thatexamines the complementary e¤ects of exporting, investment in technology, and …rm productivity.
We side-step from the relations between investment, trade, and productivity, and focus instead on
an independent channel through which specialization in core products after exporting can a¤ect a…rm’s productivity.
Third, as is mentioned in the introduction, our paper is related to the existing studies thatconsistently …nd exporters to be more capital- or skill-intensive (e.g., Bernard and Wagner, 1997;
Bernard and Jensen, 2004; Van Biesebroeck, 2005; and De Loecker, 2007). While most of thesestudies are silent about the speci…c channels through which exporting a¤ects …rms’factor intensity,
the conventional wisdom in the literature is that only the most productive …rms select into exportingor that …rms invest to upgrade their product quality or production technology before exporting. To
the extent that …rms’capability is positively correlated with skill or capital intensity (e.g., Yeaple,
2005; Harrigan and Reshef, 2012) or investments are skill and capital-biased (e.g., Verhoogen,2008), the literature about the productivity premium of exporters can be readily used to explain
higher capital and skill intensity of exporters. Notice that our …ndings of lower capital intensity
among Chinese exporters should not be taken as a rejection to the investment hypothesis. What
our …ndings imply is that the product churning channel we propose potentially dominates theinvestment and selection mechanisms in China, which leads to a net decline in capital intensity
among exporters.

3

Data

For our empirical analysis, we use two data sets – manufacturing …rm panel data and customs
transactions-level data. The …rm data are from the annual surveys of industrial …rms conductedby China’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) over the 1998-2007 period. The surveys cover allstate-owned …rms and all non-state-owned …rms with sales above 5 million yuan (about 0.6 million
USD during the sample period).6 The data set contains detailed information for about 100 balanceexports causally raises productivity of Chinese …rms that export to developed countries.
6
The unit of analysis is a …rm, and not the plant, but other information in the survey suggests that more than
95% of all observations in our sample are single-plant …rms.

6sheet variables, including …rm ID, address, ownership, output, value added, four-digit industry code(about 480 categories), six-digit geographic code, exports, employment, original value of …xed asset,
and intermediate inputs. The …rms in our sample account for 57% of total industrial value added in1998 and 94% in 2007. Since we focus on manufacturing, mining and utility industries are excluded
from our sample. Moreover, we delete observations with missing values for key variables and thosethat fail to satisfy some basic error checks.7 The cleaned data set provides an unbalanced panel of…rms that increases in coverage from 148,685 …rms in 1998 to 313,048 in 2007.
We use unique numerical IDs to link …rms in the sample over time. Firms occasionally receive
a new ID as a result of restructuring, merger, or acquisition. Where possible, we aim to track …rms
as their boundaries or ownership structures change, using information on the …rm’s name, industry,address, etc., to link them.8 These other matches are still important as one-sixth of all …rms thatare observed for more than one year experience a change in their o¢ cial ID over the period ofanalysis.
In the later part of the paper, we also use transactions-level trade data from China Customs
that cover all transactions of Chinese exporters and importers over 2000-2006. The trade dataset
provides information on import and export values, quantities, and prices between China and over
200 destination countries at the HS 6-digit level for each trading …rm, by ownership of enterprise(out of 9 types, e.g. state owned, foreign invested, Sino-foreign joint ventures), and customs regime(ordinary trade and processing trade).9 As an example, Table A5 in the appendix shows the HS
6-digit products within the industry of “footware, gaiters, & the like” (HS2 = 64). The purposeof using this data set is to study product churning and within-…rm dynamics after a …rm starts
exporting. We merge the manufacturing …rm data with the transactions-level trade data based
on …rm names.10 Statistics about the merging are reported in Table A4 in the appendix. We use
the merged data set to identify new exporters in the trade data set, and compute the measures ofcapital intensity at the product level (HS6).11 Details about the steps to compute the product-level
7

Some …rms have missing observations for variables needed to calculate productivity. This arises either because
the information was not originally reported, or because of negative values for variables such as the real capital stockor value added. Following Je¤erson, Rawski and Zhang (2008), we drop all …rms with less than 8 employees as theyfell under a di¤erent legal regime. As a result, 17% of …rms in the the original data set are dropped from the sample
in 1998, but the fraction drops to 6% in each year after 2001.
8
The fraction of …rms in a year that can be linked to a …rm in the previous year increases over time from 84.5% in
the …rst two years (1998-1999) to 92.2% in the …nal two years (2006-2007). Overall, 95.9% of all year-to-year matches
are constructed using …rm IDs, and 4.1% using other information on the …rm.
9
The data also report quantity, quantity units, customs o¢ ces (ports) where the transaction was processed (97 in
total), and transportation modes.
10
Depending on the year, 37-48% of export value in the trade data set is successfully merged to the NBS …rm data
set. 70% of exporters in NBS is merged.
11
To the best of our knowledge, Bernard, et al. (2010) are the only group of researchers who did the same data
construction before. They compute the measures of factor intensity at the SIC 5-digit level for the US, and …nd
substantial within-sector (2-digit) heterogeneity in capital and skill intensity.

7

capital intensities are provided in Appendix A.3.
A …rm’s real output and value added are de‡ated by a sector-speci…c ex-factory price index.12
Real wages are calculated using consumer price index.13 A …rm’s capital intensity is de…ned as thereal value of capital stock per worker.
Since capital intensity is the focus of this paper, it is crucial to measure both …rm capital andlabor accurately. Firms do not report …xed investment. For capital stock, the NBS data only report
the original value of …xed asset (OVFS) and net value of …xed asset (NVFS). OVFS is the total
capital stock at original purchase prices, and NVFS is equal to OVFS less accumulated depreciation.
Thus, OVFS and NVFS are the sum of nominal values of di¤erent years. To deal with this problem,
we follow the recent estimation method in Brandt, Van Biesebroeck, and Zhang (2011). The idea
is to use information from the founding year of a …rm to estimate the …rm’s initial capital stock.
Then we apply perpetual inventory method and calculate …rm real capital stock in each year. In
this procedure, we assume a depreciation rate of 9% and de‡ate nominal …xed investment using
the de‡ators constructed in Perkins and Rawski (2008).14 A …rm’s nominal …xed investment is theobserved change in OVFS. To test the robustness of our results, we also use the NVFS de‡ated byindustry-speci…c investment price index as an alternative measure of real capital stock.
As an attempt to adjust for the quality of workers employed by a …rm, we use total wage billinstead of employment to compute an alternative measure of labor. The problem with wages is that
it is likely to underestimate the total employee compensation which should also include employee
supplementary bene…ts. In our data, labor’s share of value added is only 34 percent, which is much
lower than 55 to 60 percent suggested by national income accounting.15 The magnitude of such
underestimation may vary across di¤erent ownership, region and year. Therefore, we decide to use
employment as our primary measure for labor and only use total wage bill for robustness check.
To deal with the biases arising from endogenous input choices, we adopt the Levinsohn andPetrin (2003) procedure that uses intermediate inputs as a proxy for unobservable productivity
shocks.16 For reasons that will become clear below, exporters and non-exporters can have di¤erent
factor intensity of production within a disaggregated sector. We thus assume di¤erent sector-speci…cproduction functions for exporters and non-exporters respectively to estimate …rm productivity.17
12

Ex-factory price refers to the price at the factory, and does not include any other charges, such as delivery or
subsequent taxes.
13
The price indices are from China Statistical Yearbook, various issues.
14
Please see the appendix of Brandt, Van Biesebroeck and Zhang (2011) for more details.
15
Hsieh and Klenow (2009) discover the same issue in the same data set. They assume that the non-wage bene…ts
are a constant fraction of a plant’s wage bill, with the adjustment factor chosen so that the wage plus non-wagecompensation equal to half of China’s aggregate value added.
16
The Levinsohn-Petrin procedure is implemented in this paper using the Stata module “levpet” developed byPetrin, Levinsohn and Poi (2004).
17
In the early version of the paper, we extend the Levinsohn-Petrin procedure by incorporating the …rm’s export

8In this paper, a non-exporter is a …rm that never exported up to and including the reportingyear. New exporters are …rms that did not export in the previous years in the sample but started
exporting in the year of analysis. Their pre-export characteristics can therefore be matched withthose of the non-exporting …rms. Existing exporters are …rms that have export records in previous
years, or …rms that start exporting already in their …rst year of the sample. When we do matching,
this group of …rms is dropped because there is no pre-exporting characteristics for these …rms byde…nition. We do include these existing exporters in the …xed e¤ects regression analysis, which wewill discuss immediately below.

4

Basic Patterns

Table A1 in the appendix reports the key statistics of new exporters, continuing exporters, andnon-exporters, respectively for the odd years in our sample. For each group of …rms, we further
separate the sample into domestic, which include state-owned and private …rms, and foreign …rms.
Among domestic …rms, the fraction of exporters ‡uctuates between 16 and 24 percent (continuing
exporters and new exporters combined), which is similar to the US where roughly 20 percent ofplants exported in 1992 (Bernard, Eaton, Jensen, and Kortum, 2003). Similar to the U.S. …rms,
over 80 percent of domestic new exporters also sell domestically in China; and about half of thedomestic new exporters derive less than 10 percent of the revenue from foreign sales. In China,
there is a signi…cant di¤erence between domestic …rms and foreign-invested enterprises in terms of
the prevalence of exporters. Foreign …rms overwhelmingly engage in exporting, with the fractionof exporters ranging between 63 percent (in 1999) and 72 percent (in 2004).
To compare the di¤erence in capital intensity and productivity between exporters (new andcontinuing exporters combined) and non-exporters, we estimate the following speci…cation:ln Si = Ei +0 + fF Eg + "i(1)where Si can be …rm i’s TFP or capital intensity. Ei is a dummy variable indicating the …rm’s
export status. fF Eg stands for a host of …xed e¤ects.

0 is a constant and "i is the error term.

The percentage di¤erential in Si between exporters and non-exporting …rms can be calculated fromthe estimated coe¢ cient as 100(exp ( )1).

In Table 1, Panel A shows the estimates of equation (1) with ln(TFP) as the dependent varidecision into the productivity estimation procedure to control for the export endogeneity problem (Van Biesebroeck,2005; De Loecker, 2007), instead of estimating productivity using separate production functions for exporters andnon-exporters, respectively. The results obtained were qualitatively similar.

9able.18 Column (1) includes Ei and year …xed e¤ects, while column (2) also includes industry andprovince …xed e¤ects. To make sure that the change is not driven by unobserved …rm characteristics, in column (3) we include …rm …xed e¤ects (along with year …xed e¤ects). We …nd thatexporters are on average more productive than non-exporters. These results about the productivity
gap are consistent with most …ndings in the existing literature, and contrast with the …ndings byLu (2010).19
In columns (4) and (5), we …nd that the productivity premium of exporters is mostly determinedby the productivity variation among domestic private …rms. Foreign exporters do not appear to be
more productive than foreign non-exporters.20 By splitting the sample into the pre-WTO period(1999-2001) and the post-WTO period (2002-2007), column (6) and (7) show that the TFP premiumof exporters is larger before China’s accession to the WTO than after (decreased from 0.13 to 0.07
log points).
Next, we present results on the gap in capital intensity between exporters and non-exporters.
Existing studies consistently …nd that exporters are more capital-intensive (e.g., Bernard and Wagner (1997) for Germany, Bernard and Jensen (2004) for the US, Van Biesebroeck (2005) for SubSaharan Africa, and De Loecker (2007) for Slovenia.). In sharp contrast, we …nd that exporters
in China are less capital-intensive than non-exporters. Speci…cally, in Panel B of Table 1, whencapital intensity is measured as the ratio of real capital stock to employment (our preferred measurethat is computed based on the perpetual inventory method proposed by Brandt, Van Biesebroeck,
and Zhang, 2011), we …nd in column (2) that exporters are about 5 percent less capital-intensive
than non-exporters within a four-digit industry (480 industries). Notice that the capital intensity
gap more than doubles for domestic private …rms than for foreign …rms (columns (5) and (6)).
When a …rm’s real capital stock is measured as the average net value of …xed assets de‡atedby the industry-speci…c investment price index (Panel C), or when capital intensity is measured
using a …rm’s total wage bill instead of employment as the denominator (Panel D), exporters still
appear to be less capital-intensive than non-exporters. The capital intensity gap is signi…cantly
18
ln(TFP) is estimated using the Levinsohn and Petrin (2003) procedures. We separately estimate each sector’s
production function for exporters and non-exporters, respectively. Firm productivity is the residual for each …rmfrom the estimation.
19
The di¤erence between our resulsts and Lu (2010) can arise from the fact that she focuses on labor productivity
while we focus on TFP. Since we show that exporters tend to be less capital-intensive, we believe that the change incapital intensity can contribute to the observed lower labor productivity within a narrowly de…ned industry. Noticethat our results are consistent with Dai, Miatra, and Yu (2012) who show that once processing …rms, which tend to
be more labor-intensive, are taken out from the sample, exporters still appear to have higher labor productivity.
20
Our …ndings that foreign exporters exhibit no superior productivity echo those by Baldwin and Gu (2003), who
also …nd no productivity premium among foreign exporters in Canada. These results lend support to the productivitysorting prediction by Helpman, Melitz, and Yeaple (2004), who show theoretically that only the most productive …rms
engage in foreign direct investment. Another explanation is that foreign …rms come with experience and knowledge
in serving foreign markets. The potential to learn by exporting is limited.

10

larger when the latter measure is used. A possible reason is that using total wage bill to compute
capital intensity partially adjusts for the quality of the …rm’s workforce. Recent studies show thatexporters are larger and tend to employ more skilled workers. This may explain why exporters’capital intensity will be even lower when it is denominated by e¤ective labor units. To conserve
space, we focus on the results based on capital intensity measured by the perpetual inventory
method (i.e., the Panel B measure). Since using the wage-bill-based capital intensity measuretends to give us a wider capital intensity gap between exporters and non-exporters, the results
reported in the rest of the paper can be considered as a lower bound of the change in capitalintensity after exporting. Attempts to adjust for the quality of workers should yield quantitatively
larger results.
Given China’s comparative advantage in labor-intensive goods, it may not seem surprisingthat exporters in China are less capital-intensive than non-exporters at …rst sight. However, since
this pattern is found within disaggregated industries at the 4-digit level (about 480 industries),
the standard factor-proportions theory of trade that emphasizes between-sector reallocation of
resources cannot explain within-industry heterogeneity in factor intensity. Given the novelty ofthese …ndings, we will devote most of the rest of the paper on explaining this pattern. We willdevelop a theoretical model to rationalize the …ndings, and discuss the linkages between capitalintensity and productivity, both before and after …rms’exporting.

5

Changes in capital intensity for new exporters

Let us now compare the change in factor intensity between non-exporters and new exporters,
4 ln(K=L)new_exporter 4 ln(K=L)non exporter . Existing exporters, those that start exporting since
the beginning of the sample, are always excluded from this analysis. As a …rst pass, we follow Lileeva
and Tre‡er (2010) to compare …rms within a quartile bin (4 on each dimension) based on …rm TFP
and capital intensity in the previous year (16 bins in total). In Table 2, the …rst column in Panel
A shows that new exporters in the lowest quartile of TFP experience an average of 0.048 (average
across all four entries in the column) log-point decline in capital intensity after exporting relative
to non-exporters within the same TFP quartile. The di¤erence is signi…cant at the 1% level. As wemove to higher TFP quartiles (moving to the right in each row), we continue to …nd a post-exporting
decline in capital intensity, but the decline is smaller the higher the TFP quartile is. The average
drop in capital intensity (relative to non-exporters) is only 0.028 log points in the highest TFP
quartile. We will empirically con…rm and theoretically explain this negative relationship between…rms’ex ante TFP and post-exporting drop in capital intensity.

11The …rst row in Panel A shows that among the …rms in the lowest quartile of ln(K=L), theaverage drop in ln(K=L) after exporting is 0.021 log-points relative to the non-exporters in thesame quartile. We …nd a larger relative post-exporting decline in ln(K=L) for …rms with ex ante
higher ln(K=L). In the highest ln(K=L) quartile, the decline increases to 0.058 log points. We will
also empirically con…rm and theoretically explain this pattern.
Panel B repeats essentially the same analysis but instead of allocating …rms into four TFP
quartile bins, we separate the sample into high and low TFP groups. Then within each group, we
further divide the …rms into small and large …rms based on …rm total sales. The reason of doing thiscut is to address the concern that the estimates of TFP using the Levinsohn-Petrin approach may
not accurately capture a …rm’s productivity, due to measurement errors, heterogeneous production
functions across ownership types, and so on. As is reported, within each TFP bin, there is no obviousdi¤erence in the relative decline in capital intensity between small and large …rms. However, thedi¤erence between high and low TFP groups of …rms is still obvious.
In addition to putting …rms into bins to compare …rms with similar characteristics, we apply
the propensity-score matching estimator proposed by Rosenbaum and Rubin (1984) and applied
by Heckman, Ichimura, and Todd (1997) in the program evaluation literature to match …rms with
ex ante similar characteristics (see Appendix A.1 for details).21 We …rst estimate the propensity
score of each …rm based on a Probit model with the dependent variable equal to 1 if a …rm starts
reporting positive exports in the current year. We include a host of pre-exporting (previous-year)…rm characteristics, including TFP, wage rate, capital intensity, …rm age, …rm sales (all in log), as
well as industry, ownership, and year …xed e¤ects as regressors.22 As an attempt to minimize thebias due to potentially omitting unobserved characteristics that may a¤ect a …rm’s decision to start
exporting, we do our matching within each of the 8 bins as de…ned in Panel B of Table 2, in the
belief that …rms within the same bin are not too di¤erent in terms of unobserved characteristics.23
Table 3 presents the estimation results of the post-exporting change in capital intensity using
propensity-score matching techniques. In column (1), we …nd a signi…cant decline in a …rm’s capitalintensity in the year when it starts exporting, compared to non-exporters. This capital intensity
gap is observed for all 8 combinations of productivity and capital-intensity bins considered in Panel
B of Table 2. The gap is larger if the new exporter is ex ante more capital-intensive (bins 5-8),
consistent with the results in Table 2. In columns (2)-(3), we split the sample into domestic …rms,
21

Previous studies have used the matching approach to search for causal e¤ects of exporting on productivity, suchas Wagner (2002), Girma, Greenaway, and Kneller (2003), Alvarez and Lopez (2005), Konings and Vandenbussche(2005), and De Locker (2007).
22
Then local linear regression weights are constructed to match new exporters and never-exporters in each cell.
Results are robust to using the nearest neighbor matching estimator.
23
Alternatively, we estimate the Probit model industry by industry. The results about the capital intensity gap
remains robust.

12which include state-owned enterprises and private …rms, and foreign-invested …rms for our analysis.
We …nd the same pattern for both types of …rms, with a larger drop in capital intensity observed in
the domestic …rm sample. In column (4), we measure capital stock simply as the net value of …xed
assets de‡ated by the industry-speci…c investment price index. The results remain largely robust
besides bins 3 and 4. In the last column, we …nd a larger decline in capital intensity after exportingwhen total wage bill is used as the denominator to compute a …rm’s capital intensity, similar to
the …ndings in Table 1.

6

Theoretical Explanation

To summarize, we have found robust evidence that a Chinese …rm becomes less capital-intensive
after exporting. We have used various methods – regressions including an exhaustive set of …xede¤ects, comparisons within bins, and matching within bins –to ensure the robutness of our results.
Our …ndings contrast with the exiting literature that consistently shows higher skill and capitalintensity for exporters. What could account for our seemingly puzzling …ndings for China? To
answer this question, we construct a variant of the model by Bernard, Redding, and Schott (2010,2011) (BRS hereafter). We …rst brie‡y discuss the set-up of the BRS model before elaborating in
greater detail our extension. Readers are referred to the original paper for details.
Consumers consume a continuum of products with identical preferences: U =
where

1= (1

hR

1
0 Cs dsi1,) > 1 is the elasticity of substitution between products. Within a product,…rms produce horizontally di¤erentiated varieties, facing their own demand. The consumption
index for product s, Cs , takes the following form:
Cs =

Z

!2

where

1= (1

1

( s (!) cs (!)) d!

,0<

< 1;

(2)

s

) > 1 is the elasticity of substitution between varieties within a product.

Following BRS, we assume that the elasticity of substitution between varieties within a product islarger than that between products ( >> 1).

Firms are exogenously di¤erent along two dimensions, namely …rm-speci…c “ability” and …rmproduct-speci…c “consumer” appeals. More speci…cally, upon paying some …xed (sunk) costs toenter any market, a …rm …rst draws its “ability”, ' 2 [0; 1), from a distribution h ('). ' is …rmspeci…c and is constant across countries and products. The …rm then draws a set of “consumer
taste” attributes for each potential product produced,

13

s 2 [0; 1), from a distribution g ( s ). The

set ofs is …rm-product speci…c and is constant across countries.

24

To serve market j, either

domestic or foreign, the …rm has to pay an extra …xed cost fj . In addition to fj , a multi-productexporter needs to incur product-speci…c …xed costs, fsj , for each product s sold in market j.25 An
exporter will export product s to market j when its

s is su¢ ciently high to cover fsj . As in BRS,

the more productive exporters have a wider product scope, all else equal, as higher ' generates
positive pro…ts even for products with low product attributes.
To rationalize our empirical results and derive a few more testable predictions regarding exporters’capital intensity, we modify the one-factor BRS model to consider two factors of production–capital and labor. Formally, …rms have the following total cost function:
T Cs = fs +

qs
w1
'

(s)

r (s) ;

(3)

where w and r are the wage rate and the rental rate, respectively. We choose the wage as thenumeraire (i.e., w = 1). Notice that the …xed cost to produce a product is assumed to have thesame factor shares as the variable costs.

(s) represents capital intensity for product s. Without

loss of generality, we rank product index s 2 [0; 1] so that(0) = 0,(1) = 1, and

0(s) > 0 (i.e.,

capital intensity is increasing in product index s). Firm pro…t maximization implies the standard
optimal price of a variety exported to country j as
psj =
where

j is the iceberg trade cost to country j.

r (s)
;
1 '

j

For simplicity, we assume thatj is identical forall products.
Consider two countries: China and destination country j. Country j (for example, the U.S.)
is assumed to be more capital-abundant than China. With trade frictions, factor prices would not
be equalized across countries and the wage-rental ratio in country j will be higher than that inlabor-abundant China in equilibrium (i.e., wj =rj > 1=r). It can then be readily shown that therelative price of product s between country j and China, Pej (s) = Pj (s) =P (s), is decreasing in

capital intensity (i.e., Pej0 (s) < 0) (see Appendix A.2 for details).26
Given that Pej (s) varies across products, an exporter has a di¤erent export portfolio to country

j compared to the domestic market, even when the set of product attributes ( s ) is identical for24

The main results of the model results will continue to hold if we assume that s is destination-product speci…c.
Think of fsj as R&D expenditure required to produce a blue print for the product or the overhead costs tomanage the product-speci…c sales team.
26
A similar point has been made by Lu (2011) to rationalize why Chinese exporters are less productive thandomestic producers in labor-intensive sectors.
25

14

di¤erent destinations.27 Consider a …rm with ', the product attribute cuto¤s (') for products, above which the …rm produces s for domestic sales, is pinned down by the following zero-pro…tcondition:
s (';

where

s (';

s (')) =

Rs

r

(s)

P (s) ' s (')

1

fs r (s) = 0;

(4)s (')) represents the …rm’s pro…t by selling product s domestically; Rs stands fordomestic aggregate expenditure spent on product s. P (s) is the ideal price index for product s.28
Solving (4) gives us the …rm-product speci…c consumer taste cuto¤s (').

Similarly, we can use

the zero-pro…t condition for export sales of product s to country j to solve for the corresponding
product attribute cuto¤,

sj (').

Importantly, for product s, the …rm’s product cuto¤ for exporting to j equals

sj (') =where

j (s) =jj (s)s (') ;

(5)

1

fsj Pbj R
fs Pb Rj1

Pj (s)P (s).

j (s) is increasing in variable ( j ) and …xed export

costs (fsj ), as well as the relative aggregate price index of country j
because a higher

Pbj
Pb

Pbj
Pb

.

Pbj
j (s) is increasing in b
P

results in a lower purchasing power of foreign consumers relative to domestic

consumers. For the same reason,j (s) is decreasing in the total spending of country j, Rj .

countries are symmetric (i.e., Pb = Pbj , R = Rj , and Pj (s) = P (s)),

j (s) =

when international trade costs are higher than domestic trade costs (i.e., fsj
Given a product attribute,

s,

j (s)

j

fsj
fs

fs and

If

1
1

j

1
1).

1 implies a weakly lower probability of exporting products, conditional on positive domestic sales. Deviating from the symmetry assumptions, Bernard,
Redding, and Schott (2009) and Lu (2011) postulate the possibility of having

j (s) < 1 and study

the resulting implications.29
P (s)If country j is relatively more capital-abundant than China, Pj(s) is decreasing in s. Given theassumption that

>

> 1,

@

j (s)
> 0.
@s

In words, all else being equal, a product attribute thatguarantees pro…table domestic sales is less likely to generate pro…table export sales to j, the higher
27

In BRS, there is a Poisson probability for the …rm to draw …rm-speci…c productivity term, and another Poisson
probability that the …rm draws a new consumer taste for a product. It is theoretically possible that a …rm gets hit bya positive productivity shock and decides to export, while its product-speci…c consumer taste shocks do not change.
Moreover, we follow BRS to assume that the distribution of abilities and product attributes are independent of one
another.
hi
R128Speci…cally, consumers’utility maximization yields Rs = P (s) 1 = 0 P (k) 1 dk R, where R is total expenhR
i 1
1
diture of the economy; P (s) = !2 s p (s; !)1 d!
.
29

In particular, Lu (2011) …nds that in labor-intensive sectors, Chinese exporters are on average less productive
than non-exporters. Based on an extension of Bernard el al. (2007), she rationalizes the …ndings by postulating that
if the domestic is more competitive than the foreign market, the domestic production cuto¤ can be lower than theexport participation cuto¤.

15

the capital intensity of the product is.
Denote capital intensity (i.e., capital cost share) for product s byrks
s = rks +wls , where ks andls are the total amounts (including …xed cost of production) of capital and labor used to produces.30 Capital intensity of a …rm with productivity ' serving only the domestic market isd (') =

Z 10e

s Rs (';s ) Is ( ss (')) ds =where subscript d denotes “domestic”; Is ( sZ 1 "Z 1es Rs (';s (')0s) g ( s) d s#

ds;s (')) is an indicator function, which equals 1 ifs ('). g ( s ) is the stationary distribution of consumer tastes, which is discussed in detail in
es ('; s ) = Rs ('; s ) is the ratio of the …rm’s product s domestic sales to its total domestic
BRS. RR(')
ssales. The last equality holds because of the law of large number: the …rm’s capital intensity isequal to the expected weighted average across all products’capital intensity.
Conditional on export participation in market j, we can derive the …rm’s capital intensity ofthe basket of goods exported to j as

j (') =

Z 10e

s Rsj (';s ) Is ( sj (s)s (')) ds =Z 1 "Z 10es Rsj (';

j (s) s (')s) g ( s) d s#

ds;

Rsj ('; s )is the ratio of the …rm’s product s sales in foreign market j to the its
Rj (')
total sales there. We assume that s is identical for product s in di¤erent markets.31 A …rm sellingesj (';
where Rs) =both at home and country j thus has the following capital intensity:d+j (') =1

Rj (')
R (') + Rj (')

d (') +

Rj (')
R (') + Rj (')

j (') .

(6)

As in BRS, given a continuum of products, the law of large number implies that a …rm’s exporting status is entirely determined by …rm productivity, ', and an overall …xed cost for exporting tocountry j, fj . Given ' ands (') ; …rm expected pro…ts from serving market j is

j (') =

Z 1 "Z 10sj (';s (')s) g ( s) d s

#

ds

fj

where fj is measured in labor in BRS, but is measured in domestic consumption bundle here.
30

e.g. rks = rksp + rksf , where ksp stands for the level of capital used for producing goods, while ksf is the corresponding amount to cover the …xed cost of production, such as developing a blue print of the product.
31
Recent literature has shown that within the same narrowly de…ned product category, product quality is higher
for exports to richer destinations (Bastos and Silva, 2010; Manova and Zhang, 2012). If product quality is positively
corrected with skill and capital intensity, as is shown by Verhoogen (2008), adjusting for the quality impact on factor
intensity should strengthen our …ndings of lower capital intensity among exporters.

16

Consider a …rm that initially serves only the domestic market at period t (i.e.,
Suppose a shock hits the …rm and lowers its …xed export cost to fj0 such thatj;t (') < fj ).

0
j;t+1 (') > fj . The…rm starts exporting to country j at period t + 1.32 For the moment, consider su¢ ciently hightrade costs so that all product cuto¤s for foreign sales are higher than the corresponding ones fordomestic sales,j (s) > 1 or

sj (') >33s (') 8s.

function g ( s ) 8s, the …rm is more likely to have aeSince @ @s(s) > 0, given the same distributions that is higher than boths (') andfor labor-intensive (low-s) products. In other words, the …rm is less likely to have

sj (')

s that justi…es

exports of capital-intensive (high s) products, even though the …rm could be already selling thesame product at home. Given a continuum of products, the (weighted) average capital intensity ofthe domestic product portfolio is the same before and after exporting (i.e.,d;t (') =d;t+1 (')).

The (weighted) average capital intensity for the export bundle will be more labor intensive (i.e.,j;t+1 (') >d;t+1 (')). In sum, we have the following proposition:

Proposition 1

A …rm’s capital intensity(') after switching from non-exporting at period t toexporting to a capital-abundant country at period t + 1 satis…es the following inequality:j;t+1 (') <

where

t (')

and

d;t+1 (') andt+1 (')

t+1 (') <d;t+1 (') =t (') ;

are the capital intensities of the …rm before and after exporting.

j;t+1 (') are the capital intensities of the domestic and foreign baskets of products

after exporting.

Given the de…nition of …rm capital intensity in eq. (6), Proposition 1 provides an explanation to
our empirical …ndings that …rms become less capital-intensive after exporting to a capital-abundant
country. Notice that Proposition 1 does not require an assumption thatit to hold, what we need is simply

@

j (s)
> 0.
@s

sj (') >sj (')s (') 8ss ('), andotherwise. In Appendix A.3, we show that as long as there are some s with
j (s)

@s

For

In fact, we can do the same exercise as Lu (2011)

and assume that there exists s (') < 1 such that@s (') 8s.
sj (') >s (')

sj (') >s ('),> 0 su¢ ces to guarantee a decline in capital intensity of a new exporter serving j.

Based on the intuition behind Proposition 1, we have the following corollary about the relationship between destinations’capital abundance and exporters’capital intensity.
32
A …rm can also switches from non-exporting to exporting after receiving a favorable shock to productivity, '.
With a few mild assumptions, our main theoretical results will go through. Since our empirical analysis has focued
on comparing exporters and non-exported with similar ex-ante characteristics, including productivity, we choose tofocus on the case of …xed-cost shocks to more closely link our theory to the empirical results.
33
Bernard et al. (2007) make a similar assumption – the productivity cuto¤s to export are higher in both capitaland labor-intensive sectors.

17

Corollary 1 Between two ex ante identical …rms, the one that starts exporting to a country thatis more capital-abundant but identical otherwise will experience a larger decline in capital intensity.

Proof: See Appendix A.2.

The idea is that when a …rm exporting to a more capital-abundant country, the product cuto¤j (s) is increasing faster in s. Furthermore, for the other aspects of the destination countries to be

identical, there must exist a product se 2 (0; 1) such thatj (s) =

(e
s) =

s),
j (e

j (s) =(s) < 1 8 s < se and(s) > 1 8 s > se. As such, there are two margins of adjustment at which a new exporter will

end up with a lower capital intensity. The …rst margin is the intensive margin –…rms will increase
sales of the existing labor-intensive products after exporting. The second margin is the extensive
margin – …rms will also add products that haves satisfyings (') >

s >

j (s)

s (') to theexport product portfolio but not the domestic product portfolio.34 Notice that this situation is more
likely to happen for labor-intensive products as

@

j (s)
> 0.
@s

Adjustments at either margin implies

an increase in the share of labor-intensive products in the …rm’s product portfolio, contributing to
a decline in its capital intensity.
Our model focuses only on product churning to explain the changes in a …rm’s factor intensity.
By no means that this is the only channel through which exporting can a¤ect an exporter’s factor
intensity. Firms may still invest in new capital or capital-intensive activities, as is shown bysome existing studies (e.g., Aw et al., 2011; Bustos, 2011). It is worth noting that our empiricalresults show a net e¤ect of exporting on capital intensity, which postulate perhaps the standard
investment e¤ects proposed in the literature is dominated by the product-churning e¤ects in China.
Importantly, our model is general enough to incorporate the investment decisions considered bythose studies and examine the gross e¤ects of product churning in other developing countries as
well.
Besides rationalizing the main …ndings of the paper, our model yields additional predictions
that will be empirically examined below. First, our model shows thats (') is decreasing in 'for all s. In other words, more productive …rms have lower product cuto¤s for both domestic andforeign sales and can a¤ord to sell a wider range of products in any given market. Thus, ex ante
more productive …rms are expected to have less product churning and thus a smaller decline incapital intensity after exporting. Using the same …rm-level data, we will examine the following
proposition.
34

Di¤erent from BRS, exporting does not result in product dropping here. In BRS, …rms drop products in generalequilibrium when trade liberalization increases competition in the domestic market.

18

An ex ante more productive …rm experiences a smaller decline in capital intensity

Proposition 2

t+1 (') after exporting. Formally,t+1 (')
t (')

6.1

0
t+1 (' )<10t (' )<

if '0 > '.

A Note about the Revenue-based Productivity Estimates

Our empirical results show that domestic …rms become more productive after they start exporting.
It is important to understand how changes in product scope after exporting, conditional on '; cancontribute to the observed productivity gain. To this end, we derive the revenue-based productivity
measure associated with domestic sales of product s as:s =where x (';s) =s l (';

1
s)

(s)

k (';

1
s)

Rs ('; s );x ('; s )

(s)

(7)

is the associated input bundle, ands is a sector-

speci…c constant that delivers a cost function equal to equation (3). By expressing the quantity
produced as qs (';s ) = ' (xs (';s)

fs ), we can rewrite (7) as:s =Since xs (';s ) is increasing inr (s)s and ',

1fs
xs (';:s)s is increasing ins and ' as well. The intuition isthat a …rm with higher product attributes and/ or …rm productivity produces more and can spreadthe …xed cost of production (or exporting) over a larger volume of production.
Similarly, the product-speci…c measured productivity corresponding to sales in country j issj =Notice that

sj >

s if

jr

(s)

1

fsj
xsj (';s).

j or resources allocated to production of exported goods, xj (';su¢ ciently high. On the other hand, higher …xed export costs, fsj ; would makesj <s ) ; ares morelikely.
The measured revenue-based productivity of an exporter (selling to country j) then becomesT[
F P j (') = dj (')

Z 1
0

Rs ('; s )ds + (1
s
R (')

19

dj ('))Z 1
0sj

Rsj ('; s )ds;
Rj (')(8)

R(')
where dj (') = R(')+R. Denote the measured TFP before exporting by T[
F P ('). According toj (')(7), when we observe T[
F P j ('0 ) > T[F P ('), it can be partly due to '0 > ', a shock that triggers
exporting, and partly due to product switching and thus reallocation of resources toward the higher“consumer taste” products, conditional on '.
In an open-economy model with symmetric countries (identical country size and factor endowment) and no iceberg trade cost, because of higher …xed costs for exporting than domestic
sales, it can be readily shown thatsj is always smaller thans 8s.

In this situation, given ',product-switching is associated with a lower measured TFP in the absence of general equilibriume¤ects.
However, when we consider asymmetric country size and factor endowment, the contributionof product switching becomes less clear. In particular, we can show that for a given product s,sj >s if and only ifjfsj
xsj ('; s )

1

>

fs
xs ('; s )1. For simplicity, suppose

j = 1, thisinequality is reduced to35
fsj
<
fs

Pj (s)P (s)j;

Rj =Pbjf, which is constant across s.36 Suppose fsjs is the same for all products, since
R=Pb(1 ) 1Pe0 (s) < 0 and( 1)(1 ) > 0; the right hand side of the inequality is decreasing in s. That

where

j =

is, the inequality is less likely to hold for capital-intensive products, all else being equal. In otherwords, the more the exporters specialize in labor-intensive products (with relatively higher ), thehigher the measured productivity gain is relative to the actual TFP gain, 4', after exporting. Thatsaid, it is possible thatsj <s even for the most labor-intensive products exported to capital-

abundant countries. This would be the case if fsj is signi…cantly higher than fs , or the destination
country is su¢ ciently small (low Rj ) or remote (high Pbj ). In that case, the actual increase in TFP

after exporting is always higher than the measured one. Specialization in labor-intensive exports
is then associated with a relative gain, instead of an absolute gain, in measured productivity.

7

Evidence on Heterogeneous Changes in Capital Intensity

We have already shown robust evidence to support Proposition 1. To this end, we examine how
an exporter is di¤erent in capital intensity from a non-exporter that shares very similar pre-export
characteristics, which identify using the propensity-score matching techniques for Table 3. Speci…3 5 fsj
fs
36

x (';

)

f

r

(';

)

R

sj >

s if and only ifssj< x(';
, fsj
< rsj
= Rsj
s)
s
s ('; s )sSupposej > 1,

Pj (s)
P (s)
j

1+

1

=

Pj (s)P (s)fs>s ('; s )

20

j;
j fsj
sj ('; s ):cally, we estimate the following equation:

where 4matched(')
i+ FInd + FP rov + Fyear + "i ;(9)0i (') is the change in …rm i s capital intensity after exporting and 4

matched(') is thei44i (') = Xichange in the mean capital intensity of its matched non-exporters. The main idea is to examine how
an exporter is di¤erent in capital intensity from a non-exporter that shares very similar pre-export
characteristics, such as ownership types. Xi is a vector of …rm i’s previous year characteristics,
including TFP and other key attributes. FInd ; FP rov ; and Fyear stand for industry, province, andyear …xed e¤ects, respectively.
The results for estimating (9) are reported in Table 4. In column (1), ln(TFP) in the previous
year is negatively correlated with the gap in the change in capital intensity, suggesting a larger
decline in the capital intensity of new exporters relative to the matched non-exporters. This …nding
supports Proposition 2. New exporter’s ex ante capital intensity is associated with a larger decline
in capital intensity after exporting. To the extent that more productive …rm pay higher wages, thenegative and signi…cant coe¢ cient on ln(wage rate) is also consistent with Proposition 2.
Beyond the model predictions, we also …nd that older …rms experience a smaller decline incapital intensity after exporting. While our model assumes exogenous …rm productivity and productappeal, one can argue that …rms’experience in sales can enhance the level of the “consumer taste”
attributes. Based on this rationale, expertise in production would imply a higher chance of selling a
product in a foreign market. Finally, a positive correlation between initial capital intensity and thedecline in capital intensity is consistent with our …ndings that more labor-intensive …rms are more
likely to start exporting (see Appendix Table A2). The rationale is that an ex-ante more capitalintensive …rm has more room to adjust its product scope to exploit the comparative advantage oflow labor costs in China, resulting in a larger drop in capital intensity. In columns (2) and (3),we …nd strong evidence con…rming the baseline results using both the domestic and foreign …rm
samples.
Next, we explore the relation between the increase in labor intensity in the …rst year of exporting and the gain in measured productivity to shed light on the “core competency”hypothesis.
According to our model predictions, new exporters that have a larger increase in labor intensity
should have a larger increase in measured productivity gain, relative to non-exporters. As is shownin Table 5, we …nd a positive coe¢ cient on the increase in labor intensity after exporting, controlling for industry, ownership, and year …xed e¤ects, as well as a number of key …rm attributes.
This positive correlation remains robust for both domestic and foreign exporters (columns (2) and21

(3)). There results are consistent with our theoretical prediction that …rms’specialization in corecompetency enhances measured TFP.

8

Evidence on Within-…rm Product Switching

Since our model emphasizes the multi-product aspect of …rms, in the remainder of the empiricalanalysis, we use transaction-level (…rm-product-year) trade data to verify the theoretical results
above. We …rst merge the NBS …rm data with the trade data as discussed in Section 3. We use
various methods to merge the two data sets, including merging by …rm name, address, and manager
names. The summary statistics of the merged data set are reported in Appendix Table A4. About
one-third of the exporters in the trade data set can be merged with the NBS data set. These merged…rms account for 37% to 49% (depending on the year) of the values of aggregate Chinese exports.
A conservative estimate shows that over 20% of Chinese exports were intermediated by trading
companies (Ahn et al., 2011; Tang and Zhang, 2012). It is worth noting that trading companies are
considered service providers, which are included in the trade data but not in the NBS industrial…rm data set. A large fraction of the unmerged …rms in our sample are thus trading companies.
Using the merged data set, we compute capital intensity for each HS 6-digit product. The
computation procedures, which are similar to the method used by Bernard et al. (2010), arediscussed in Appendix A.3. Table A6 in the appendix reports the measured capital intensity bybroad industries (approximately at the level of HS 2-digit). Similar to the …ndings by Bernard et al.
(2010) for the U.S., there exists a wide variation in capital intensity within industries. For instance,
the mean capital intensity of the “textiles and textile articles” industry is about 68 thousands
yuan per worker, with standard deviation across HS6 products equal to about 55 thousands. The
number of HS6 product categories ranges from 9 (Works of art) to 818 (Textile and textile articles),suggesting that …rms have a wide range of products with vastly di¤erent capital intensity to choose
from within the same industry. In fact, based on the transaction-level data, Table 6 shows thatexporters actively add and drop products over time. New exporters in year t (those who did notexport in t

1 according to the NBS data set) on average added about 10 products, dropped 6

products, and continued only 5 products per year between 2002 and 2006. This active within-…rm
extensive margin of trade can play an important role in a¤ecting factor intensity and measured
productivity after export participation.
Using the merged data set and capital intensity measures at the HS 6-digit level, we compare
the (average) capital intensity of the newly added products, dropped products, and products thatwere continued from the previous year. To this end, we …rst record all products exported in the22

…rst year and subsequent years for each new exporter. In each subsequent year, we keep track of
the new, dropped, and continued products. Then for each exporter-year, we compute the salesweighted averages of capital intensity for each of the following product portfolios: the newly added
products, the continued products, and the dropped products. With this panel data set in hand, we
estimate the following speci…cation:ln(K=L)ik =+(new_productik ) + (dropped_productik ) + ei ;(10)where ln(K=L)ik is the sales-weighted average of capital intensity for …rm i and basket k 2
fnew_products; contining_products; dropped_productsg :is a constant and ei the error term.

Our model predicts that newly added products are less capital-intensive than the basket of continued products, while dropped products are more capital-intensive (i.e.,< 0 and> 0).

As is shown in Table 7, the estimated coe¢ cient on the new-product dummy is negative andsigni…cant using the pooled sample, while the dropped product dummy is positive and signi…cant.
More speci…cally, the new products are about 5 percent less capital-intensive than the continuously
exported products, while the dropped products are about 2 percent more capital-intensive. These
results continue to hold when we exclude intermediaries in column (2). Importantly, the results
remain robust when we use the sample of only ordinary exporters in column (3), and only processing
exporters, who assemble imported intermediates into …nal products solely for foreign sales, incolumn (4). These …ndings address the concern that our results are driven by the predominance ofexport-processing plants in China.
Our model predicts that exporting to a more capital-abundant country should be associatedwith a larger decline in …rm capital intensity. To examine this hypothesis, we split the sample into
two, with one being a group including exporters primarily serving the capital-abundant countries
and another group including exporters primarily serving the labor-abundant countries. A country
is considered as capital-abundant if has relative capital endowment than the median in our sample.
We then run the same regression over the two di¤erent samples. As is shown in columns (5) and (6),products added by exporters serving capital-abundant destinations tend to be less capital-intensive,
compared to those added by exporters serving labor-abundant destinations. There is little di¤erencein the factor intensity of the dropped products between the two groups of exporters.

9

Concluding Remarks

This paper analyzes the causal relations between …rms’ productivity, factor intensity, and export
participation. In particular, we provide empirical evidence on how …rms’ specialization in core23

products after exporting can a¤ect their factor intensity and measured productivity. Using panel
data for China’s manufacturing …rms over the period of 1998-2007 and the matched samplingtechniques for identi…cation, we …nd that exporting increases domestic …rms’measured productivity
but lowers their capital intensity.
To rationalize these results that contrast sharply to the existing literature, we develop a variantof the model by Bernard, Redding, and Schott (2010, 2011) to consider …rms producing multiple
products with varying capital intensity. Our model predicts that …rms in labor-abundant countries specialize in their core competencies by allocating more resources to produce labor-intensive
products once they start exporting . We discuss how this within-…rm reallocation of resources
account for higher measured productivity after exporting. Firm ex ante productivity is associatedwith a smaller decline in capital intensity after exporting. A sharper post-exporting decline incapital intensity is associated with a larger increase in measured total factor productivity. Using
transaction-level trade data, we …nd evidence that Chinese exporters add new products that are
more labor-intensive than the existing exported products, and drop products that are less laborintensive over time.

24

10

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29

A

Appendix (not for publication)

A.1

Di¤erence-in-di¤erence (DID) Matching Estimator

This appendix discusses the di¤erence-in-di¤erence (DID) matching estimator of Heckman, Ichimura,and Todd (1997). We need to estimate the average e¤ect of exporting on the export starters in agiven year as follows:
E Si1

Si0 jStarti = 1 = E Si1 jStarti = 1

E Si0 jStarti = 1 ;where the superscript denotes the export status. The challenge is that the counterfactual outcome if
the exporter did not export, Si0 , is not observable. The DID matching estimator is a non-parametricapproach to estimating the e¤ect of exporting (DIDX ) in year t, which is given by the following
formula:2
3X
X
1
4(S1;t;i S0;t 1;i )DIDX;t =W (i; j) (S0;t;i S0;t 1;i )5n1
i2I1 \Cp

j2I0 \Cpwhere S1;t;i is …rm i’s characteristics, including TFP and capital intensity (K/L). Subscript ‘1,t’
denotes …rms that start exporting in year t, which are not exporting at year t 1 and therefore
are denoted by subscript ‘0; t 1’. Subscript ‘0; t’ denotes …rms that never export in the sample
period. I1 denotes the group of new exporters. Cp is the region of common support. n1 is thenumber of new exporters that can be matched by a corresponding comparison group. W (i; j) is
the non-parametric weight from the local linear regression on propensity score, de…ned asP
Gij k2I0 Gik (Pk Pi )2 Gij (PjW (i; j) = P
PPi )2
j2I0 Gij
k2I0 Gik (Pk

Pi )
P

P

k2I0 Gik (Pkk2I0 Gik (Pk

Pi )

Pi )
2

where Gij = G((Pi Pj )=hn ), G(:) and hn denote a kernel function and a bandwidth parameter
respectively. Pi is the propensity score of …rm i estimated by a probit model conditional on a vector
of pre-entry characteristics of …rms including ln(TFP), wage, capital intensity, …rm age, sales, andprovince …xed e¤ects.
The propensity score matching is implemented by the PSMATCH2 module in Stata developed
by Leuven and Sianesi (2003). Technical details about the local linear regression matching estimatorand the nearest neighbor matching estimator can be found in Fan (1993) and Becker and Ichino(2002).

A.2

Theoretical Derivation

We …rst present the derivation of the consumer taste cuto¤s for domestic sales, s ('), and exports,
sj ('), which are omitted in the main text. For a …rm with total factor productivity ', theconsumer taste cuto¤ s (') for product s , above which the …rm produces the product for domestic
sales, can be obtained by solving the following zero-pro…t condition (see BRS (2010) for details):s (';s (')) =Rs( P (s) ' s ('))

1

fs r (s) = 0;

(A-1)

where s ('; s (')) represents the …rm’s pro…t by selling a variety of product i domestically; Rs
stands for domestic expenditure spent on product s. P (s)h is the ideal price index for
i product s.
R1
Speci…cally, consumers’ utility maximization yields Rs = P (s) 1 = 0 P (k) 1 dk R, where R
30

hR

i 1

1

1

is total expenditure of the economy; P (s) = !2 s p (s; !)d!
. Expressing Rs in terms of
R1
P (s) ; R, and Pb = 0 P (k) 1 dk in (A-1) gives the following expression.
r (s) fs Pb
R&P (s)s (') =
'

1

! 1

1

;

where & =). Similarly, we can use the zero-pro…tand = ( (11)(1) 1) . > 0 if 1 < (1condition for export sales of product s to country j to solve for the consumer taste cuto¤ for foreign
sales as1

Dividing! 1

r (s) fsj Pbj
Rj& j Pj (s)sj (') ='sj (') by1:s (') gives the ratio in (4).
P (s)Next, we show that Pj(s) is decreasing in s if j is more capital-abundant than China (i.e.,wj
1
rj > r ): The price indices for a given product (suppressed product index s for simplicity) in China(c) and in country j, respectively are

Pj

=

"Z

!2 j

Pc =

"Z

!2

c

pj (!)j (!)

1

pc (!)
(!)

1

d! +

Z

!2

d! +

Z

!2

cj pc (!)

1

1

d!

(!)

cj

jc pj (!)

1

# 1

;

1

d!

(!)

jc

# 1

;

where k represents the set of products sold by …rms in the domestic market k, and kl stands forthe set of products exported by domestic …rms in country k to country l. kl > 1 is the iceberg
trade cost for exporting from country k to country l.
Following the procedures in Bernard et al. (2007), the two price indices can be expressed as

Pj

2

= 4Mj
2

Pc = 4Mc

wj1

rj
'
ej

r
'
ec

!1

+ Mcj

1

+ Mjc

1

cj r

1
jc wj

'
e cj

'
e jc

rj

!1

3 1
1

5

3 1
5

;

1

;

where '
e k represents the weighted average productivity of …rms selling in the domestic market
k, weighted by the product attributes(see Bernard et al. (forthcoming) for details); while'
e kl represents the weighted average productivity of …rms in country k that export to country l.
Mk and Mkl are the mass of …rms selling in own market k or exporting from country k to countryl, respectively.
All these variables can be solved in general equilibrium in terms of underlying parameters of the
distribution of ' and , given a constant mass of potential entrants. To conserve space, we refer
the readers to Bernard et al. (2007 and 2010) for details. For simplicity, assume that each country
has a mass of M potential entrants at any given point in time. Without solving the model fully, we31do know that since the …xed cost for exporting is higher than that for domestic sales, Mc > Mcj ,Mj > Mjc , 'e cj > 'e c ; and 'e jc > 'e j . Let us also assume that Mj =Mc , Mjc =Mcj , and 'e c =e'j are all
increasing in . We will come back to verify the validity of these assumptions later.
Pj
Pcw

Since rjj > wr =)P

wj r
rj > 1.
1

Mjc
Mc
Mj + Mj

1

=
'
ej 1
'
e c wj

wj r
rj

'
e jc
'
ec

1
jc wj
1

1

wj r
rj
'
e cj
ec
cj '

M
+ Mcjj1:

With the assumptions on M ’s and 'e 0 s we made, it can be read-is decreasing in (capital intensity). Thus, given a relatively “tougher
ily shown that Pjc
market” for capital-intensive sectors in j, and given the mass of …rms M , we can then show that
Mj =Mc ; Mjc =Mcj , and 'e c =e'j are all increasing in , con…rming our initial assumptions.
A.2.1

Discussion about Proposition 1

We now discuss brie‡y the argument that Proposition 1 holds as long as 9s (') 2 (0; 1] such thats (') and sj (') > s (') 8s > s ('). That is, for some products, there always
sj (')s (') 8s
exist customer taste cuto¤s for exporting that are higher than those for domestic sales. Consider
a …rm that receives a favorable productivity shock (i.e., 't > 't 1 ) that triggers exporting tocountry j. Consider a given set of “consumer tastes”, 0 s. For s s ('), the probability that the…rm exports product s to country j, conditional on positive domestic sales of product s is equal
to 1 = 1. For s s ('), the probability of positive export sales conditional on no domestic sales
1 G(
('))
is 2 = G( sj. For s > s ('), the probability of positive export sales conditional on positives ('))
1 G(('))
domestic sales (the standard consideration) is 3 = 1 G( sj(')) ; and the probability of positivesexport sales conditional on no domestic sales is 4 = 0. 2 is increasing in s while 3 is decreasing
in s if and only if sj (') = s (') is increasing in s. Considering all four situations together, a
new exporter is more likely to add products if ss ('); but less likely to export products withs > s ('), less so for higher s. This mechanism delivers d (') > j ('). In sum, Proposition 1
still holds even sj (')
s (') 2 (0; 1]:s (') 8s
A.2.2

Proof of Corollary 1

The expression for the capital intensity of the …rm after exporting (eq. (6)) can be rewritten as
follows:

d+j (') =

Z 1(
0

s

Z

j (s) s (')
s (')

bs (';Rs) g ( s) d s +Z 1

j (s) s (')

hibs ('; s ) + R
bsj ('; s ) g ( s ) d sR(A-2)
bs ('; s )bsj ('; s )and R
Notice that for products that havewhere Rs 2 [ s (') ; j (s) s (')), the …rm only sells the product in the domestic market, making revenue
Rs ('; s )equal to Rs ('; s ) as before. Their shares in the …rm’s total sales will drop (i.e., R(')+R<j (')
Rs ('; s )R(')+Rj (')

Rsj ('; s )R(')+Rj (') .

Rs ('; s )R(') ). For products that haves (') > j (s) s ('), the change in the share of each individual
product is ambiguous. However, since products with s (') < j (s) s (') all have lower sharesin the …rm’s total sales, at least some products with s (') > j (s) s (') must experience an

32

)

ds;

increase in their share in the …rm’s total sales, contributing a larger weight in a¤ecting the …rm’s@ j (s)capital intensity. Since @s> 0, the probability that the product will have a larger weight isdecreasing in s. In other words, labor-intensive products are more likely to have a larger weight in
the …rm’s product portfolio. By the law of large number, the …rm’s capital intensity will be lower
after exporting to a country that is more capital-abundant than China.
Now consider another …rm that has the same '. By the law of large number, its ex ante average
capital intensity across products is the same, yielding the same ex ante …rm capital intensity.
Suppose it also starts exporting but to country k, which is less capital-abundant than j but more
capital abundant than China. For simplicity, suppose all costs for exporting to k are the same as
those for exporting to j ( j = k , fsj = fsk ), and that both destination countries have the same(s)real incomes, kj (s)can be expressed as follows:37
k (s)
j (s)

=

Pj (s)Pk (s)

.

P (s)

(s)
Given that k is more capital-abundant than j, Pkj (s) and thus kj (s)are increasing in s.38 In words,
if the destination country is more capital-abundant, the product cuto¤ for exporting is rising fasterin s. Thus, destination countries’ capital endowment will be associated with di¤erent productcomposition and thus …rm capital intensity. If k (s) = j (s) is increasing in s and k (s) > j (s)for s > sb 2 (0; 1), according to eq. (A-2), by the law of large number, exporting to a more capitalabundant country is associated with larger shares of labor-intensive products in the …rm’s productportfolio. Thus, d+k (') < d+j (') even though the two …rms have the same ex ante capitalintensity.

A.3

Procedures to compute the measures of capital intensity at the HS 6-digit
level

A.3.1

Use the pooled sample

1. Calculate the capital intensity of each …rm in the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) …rm
data.
2. Merge NBS data with customs data using …rm names, addresses, and other …rm identi…ers.
3. For each HS6 product, calculate the weighted average of capital intensity, with weights equal
to …rm sales of the same product according to the NBS data set.
A.3.2

For each new exporter

1. For new exporters in 2001 (who didn’t export in 2000, the …rst year in the customs data set),…nd continuing products and newly added products in 2002.
2. For each new exporter in 2001, calculate the capital intensity of new products and continuing
products in 2002.
3. Repeat the Steps 1-2 for 2002 all the way to 2005.
37

Generically,

k (s)
k (s)

=

k
j

bj
fsk Rj =P
bk
fsj Rk =P

1
1

Pj (s)Pk (s):P (s)For our assumption of identical price indices across countries (i.e., Pbj = Pbk ) to hold andexist sb 2 (0; 1) so that Pj (s) < Pk (s) for s 2 (0; sb) and Pj (s) Pk (s) for s 2 [bs; 1).
38

33@ P j (s)k@s> 0, there must

3.5

3.6

3.7

3.8

3.9

Figure 1: Ten-year Unbalanced Sample, Average ln(K/L)

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002
2003
year

Exporters

2004

2005

2006

2007

Non-Exporters

Average ln(K/L) is calculated using China's NBS Industrial Survey Data

3.8

3.9

4

4.1

4.2

4.3

Figure 2: Ten-year Balanced Sample, Average ln(K/L)

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002
2003
year

Exporters

2004

2005

2006

2007

Non-Exporters

Average ln(K/L) is calculated using China's NBS Industrial Survey Data

0.1

Density.2.3.4

Figure 3: Distribution of ln(K/L)) in 2007

0

2

4

6

8

ln_KL
exporters

non-exportersln(K/L) are measured relative to the ownership and industry (4-digit) means

10Table 1: Comparing Productivity and Capital Intensity of Exporters and Non-Exporters(1)
All Firms

(2)

(3)

All Firms All Firms

(4)

(5)

(6)

(7)

Domestic
Firms

Foreign
Firms

Before
WTO

After
WTO

Panel A: Dependent variable ln(TFP)
Exporter

0.137[0.000]***

0.087
0.124
0.095
[0.000]*** [0.000]*** [0.001]***0.003[0.439]0.132[0.000]***0.074[0.000]***N

1,916,347

1,916,347

421,232

543,921

1,372,426

1,916,347

1,495,115

Panel B: Dependent variable ln(K/L)
Exporter-0.191[0.000]***-0.062-0.054-0.072-0.031-0.021[0.000]*** [0.000]*** [0.000]*** [0.000]*** [0.000]***-0.075[0.000]***N

1,976,637

1,976,637

1,976,637

1,555,076

421,561

568,127

1,431,350

Panel C: Dependent variable ln(K/L), alternative measure of K
Exporter-0.171[0.000]***-0.024-0.028-0.026[0.000]*** [0.000]*** [0.000]***-0.017[0.078]*0.002[0.564]-0.025[0.000]***N

1,982,457

1,982,457

421,678

568,725

1,413,365

1,982,457

1,560,779

Panel D: Dependent variable ln(K/L), alternative measure of L
Exporter-0.311[0.000]***-0.143-0.116-0.175-0.078-0.124[0.000]*** [0.000]*** [0.000]*** [0.000]*** [0.000]***-0.158[0.000]***N

1,976,637

1,976,637

1,976,637

1,554,766

421,463

568,121

1,431,480

Year FE

Yes

Yes

No

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Industry (4-digit) FE

No

Yes

No

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Ownership FE
Firm FE

No
No

Yes
No

No
Yes

No
No

No
No

Yes
No

Yes
No

Notes: This table reports estimation results for equation (1) in the text. The Exporter dummy equals 1 if a firm iseither a new exporter or a continuing exporter. Column (2) includes four-digit (about 480) industry, ownership andprovince fixed effects. In Panel A, ln(TFP) is measured using the Levinsohn-Petrin (2003) method. In Panel B, realcapital stock (K) is measured using the perpetual inventory method specified in Brandt et al. (2011), while labor isthe firm's total employment. In Panel C, capital stock is the net value of fixed assets deflated by the sector-specificcapital-good deflator, while labor is the firm's total employment. In Panel D, capital stock is measured using theperpetual inventory method specified in Brandt et al. (2011), while labor is the firm's total wage bill. Columns (1)and (2) compare exporters and non-exporters using all firms in the sample; column (3) includes only domestic firms;
column (4) includes only foreign-invested enterprieses (FIEs); column (5) and (6) split the sample into that before
2002 when China was accessed to the WTO; and that after and including 2002; column (7) includes only firm fixed ef
Numbers reported in brackets are p-values corrected for four-digit industry clustering. *, **, and *** indicate
significance at the 10%, 5%, and 1% levels, respectively.

Table 2: Capital Intensity Growth: New Exporters Less Non-Exporters
Δln(K/L)new exporter − Δln(K/L)non-exporterln(TFP) quartiles before exporting

Panel Aln(K/L)quartiles
beforeexporting

1

2

3

4

1

-0.033***-0.031***-0.018**-0.002*

2-0.045***-0.039***-0.026***-0.019**3-0.051***-0.043***-0.038***-0.039***4-0.063***-0.061***-0.055***-0.051***

low TFP

Panel Bsmall firmsln(K/L)
beforeexportinghigh TFP
large firms

small firms

large firms-0.011** (bin 3)-0.021** (bin 4)

low-0.035*** (bin 1) -0.039*** (bin 2)

high-0.056*** (bin 5) -0.053*** (bin 6) -0.049*** (bin 7) -0.043*** (bin 8)

Notes: This table reports the difference of capital intensity growth between new exporters and non-exporters foreach bin. In Panel A, bins are defined by ln(TFP) and ln(K/L) quartiles. In Panel B, bins are defined byln(TFP), ln(K/L) and ln(sales). We calculate these bins industry by industry to ensure each bin covers allindustries. *, **, and *** indicate significance at the 10%, 5%, and 1% levels, respectively.

(1)

(2)

(3)

All Firms

Domestic
Firms

Foreign
Firms

All Bins-0.051***-0.054***-0.042***-0.027**-0.069***1-0.046***-0.049***-0.036***-0.028***-0.035***-0.048***-0.048***-0.037***-0.024*-0.046***

L TFP-0.029**-0.031**-0.0290.001-0.024***-0.032**-0.041**-0.027-0.009-0.032***

H TFP-0.064***-0.067***-0.061***-0.044**-0.102***-0.061***-0.066***-0.053***-0.029*-0.113***

L TFP

Table 3: New Exporters' Capital Intensity ln(K/L) - Propensity Score Matching
Results-0.063***-0.068***-0.051***-0.043***-0.096***-0.059***-0.062***-0.61***-0.039***-0.103***

3
4

6

7
8

High K/L

5

H TFP

2

K/L TFPGroup Group

Low K/L

Bin

(4)

(5)

Alternative K Alternative L

Notes: This table reports the estimation results of the impact of exporting on ln(K/L) for new exporters,
using DID propensity score matching method. The matching is conducted within each bin. These bins (bin1
to bin 8) are illustrated in Panel B of Table 2. Column (1) uses all firms in the sample; column (2) includes
only domestic firms; column (3) includes only foreign-invested enterprieses (FIEs); columns (4) measurescapital stock as the net value of fixed assets deflated by the sector-specific capital-good deflator, while
column (5) uses the firm's total wage bill to compute capital intensity. *, **, and *** indicate significance atthe 10%, 5%, and 1% levels, respectively.

Table 4: Ex ante Productivity and Ex post Capital Intensity
Dependent Variable = Δln(K/L)non-exporter - Δln(K/L)new exporter
(1)

(2)

(3)

All New Exporters

Domestic New
Exporters only

Foreign New Exporters
only

ln(TFP)t-1-0.096[0.006]***-0.132[0.007]***0.021[0.011]**ln(K/L)t-1

0.298[0.000]***0.345[0.000]***0.276[0.000]***ln(wage rate)t-1-0.188[0.000]***-0.193[0.000]***-0.198[0.024]**ln(age)t-1-0.029[0.008]***-0.035[0.009]***-0.027[0.012]**

Ownership FE

Yes

No

No

Industry FE

Yes

Yes

Yes

Province FE

Yes

Yes

Yes

N

49,74233,40916,333

Notes: All regressors are lagged by one year. Only new exporters are included in the regressions. Pvalues based on standard errors clustered at the four-digit industry are reported in brackets. *, **, and*** indicate significance at the 10%, 5%, and 1% levels, respectively. Exporters and their matched
non-exporters are matched using the DID propensity score matching techniques which is conductedwithin their own bins.

Table 5: Determinants of the TFP effects
Dependent Variable = Δln(TFP)new exporter - Δln(TFP)non exporter
(1)

(2)

(3)

All New Exporters

Domestic New
Exporters only

Foreign New Exporters
only△labor intensityt-1,t

0.049[0.000]***0.055[0.005]***0.022[0.022]**ln(TFP)t-1

0.121[0.000]***0.135[0.000]***0.119[0.000]***ln(wage rate)t-1

0.087[0.000]***0.093[0.002]***0.076[0.002]***ln(age)t-1-0.076[0.009]***-0.086[0.013]**-0.078[0.037]**

Industry FE

Yes

Yes

Yes

Onwership FE

Yes

No

No

Province FE

Yes

Yes

Yes

N

50,01933,637

16,382

Notes: All regressors are lagged by one year, besides labor intensity increase, which is defined as thefirst difference in labor intensity from year t-1 to t. Only new exporters are included in the regressions. Pvalues, based on standard errors clustered at the four-digit industry level, are reported in brackets. *, **,and *** indicate significance at the 10%, 5%, and 1% levels, respectively.

Table 6: Product Switching of New Exporters (Customs Transaction-level Data)

Number of newexporters

Number of newexporters thatsurvived to nextyear

Total (average)
number of
products added
next year

Total (average)
number of
products dropped
next year

Total number ofcontinuing
products

2001

15,92813,187134059 (10.17)56389 (4.28)

63929 (4.85)

2002

21,383

18,410176066 (9.56)

82096 (4.46)

98364 (5.34)

2003

27,107

22,941229762 (10.02)

127959 (5.58)

125753 (5.48)

2004

37,646

31,583322921 (10.22)

207112 (6.56)

161901 (5.13)

2005

40,02433,552311839 (9.29)

265860 (7.92)

166894 (4.97)

2006

46,400

Average

31,41523,935

9.85

5.76

5.15

2000

Source: Transaction-level trade data from China Customs (2000-2006)
Notes: A product is defined as a HS 6-digit category. There are over 5000 HS-6 categories.

Table 7: Capital Intensity of New Products and Dropped Products
Dependent Variable: ln(K/L)

New Product Portfolio
Dummy
Dropped Product Portfolio
DummyYear Fixed Effects
N

(1)

(2)

(3)

All New
Exporters

All New
Exporters
ExcludingIntermediaries-0.048-0.049-0.050[0.000]***[0.000]***

0.023

(4)

(5)

(6)

CapitalAbundant
Destinations

Labor-Abundant
Destinations-0.045-0.050-0.043[0.000]***[0.000]***[0.000]***[0.000]***

0.021

0.024

0.013

0.022

0.023

[0.000]***[0.000]***[0.000]***[0.005]***[0.000]***[0.002]***

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

326,784

281,035

252,887

73,897

213,272

42,987

New Ordinary New Processing
Exporters
Exporters

Notes: This table reports the results of regressions of capital intensity on the new product portfolio dummy and the dropped product portfolio
dummy. The omitted group is the continuing product portfolio. Column (2) excludes all trade intermediaries. Columns (3) and (4) use thesubsamples of ordinary and processing trade new exporters. Column (5) and (6) use the subsamples of the exports to capital-abundant countries
and labor-abundant countries. The classification of capital abundance is based on Antweiler and Trefler (2002). P-values, based on robust
standard errors, are reported in brackets. *, **, and *** indicate significance at the 10%, 5%, and 1% levels, respectively.

Appendix Tables (Not for publication)
Table A1: New Exporter Information 1999-2007 (Odd years only)
1999

2001

2003

2005

2007

Domestic

Foreign Domestic

Foreign

Domestic

Foreign Domestic Foreign Domestic

Foreign

Total no. of firms

118,251

25,272

121,896

29,332

140,107

36,192

195,90255,597

246,558

78,801

%

100%

100%

100%

100%

100%

100%

100%

100%

100%

100%

Non-exporters

97,0799,209

96,944

9,534

107,578

10,954

156,325

20,786208,027

26,220

%

82%

36%

80%

33%

77%

30%

80%

37%

84%

33%

Continuing exporters

18,394

14,742

23,38318,44230,12823,61631,08832,75933,504

49,773

%

16%

58%

19%

63%

22%

65%

16%

59%

14%

63%

New exporters

2,778

1,321

1,569

1356

2,401

1622

8,489

2,052

5,027

2,808

%

2.3%

5.2%

1.3%

4.6%

1.7%

4.5%

4.3%

3.7%

2.0%

3.6%

Export intensity of new exporters (%)
0 to 10

35.9

25.2

41.1

35.1

38.9

33.8

58.1

36.0

46.2

36.1

10 to 20

11.1

7.7

11.9

9.7

11.6

9.9

20.3

12.5

11.6

10.5

20 to 30

7.2

5.1

6.6

9.2

7.8

5.3

3.8

6.2

5.8

5.9

30 to 40

6.0

4.1

5.2

4.6

6.1

4.3

2.5

4.2

4.5

4.2

40 to 50

6.2

6.0

3.9

2.8

5.1

4.0

2.1

4.0

3.5

3.9

50 to 60

4.4

4.2

4.2

3.0

4.8

4.0

1.2

3.7

2.4

3.2

60 to 70

5.3

4.7

3.3

2.4

4.3

4.2

1.2

3.1

2.3

2.9

70 to 80
80 to 90
90 to 100
Sum

4.2
5.7
14.2
100.0

6.8
7.6
28.7
100.0

3.5
5.3
15.1
100.0

4.2
4.9
24.1
100.0

4.0
3.7
13.8
100.0

4.7
4.9
24.9
100.0

1.4
1.4
8.1
100.0

3.4
2.8
24.1
100.0

2.2
2.2
19.3
100.0

3.1
3.5
26.7
100.0

Source: China's National Bureau of Statistics industrial (above-scale) firm survey data.

Table A2: The Decision to Start Exporting
Dependent variable: New-exporter indicator
Probit estimation

Domestic firms

Foreign firms

ln TFP

0.113[0.000]***0.002[0.314]

Wage per worker

0.030[0.000]***0.008[0.298]

Capital/labor-0.038[0.000]***-0.031[0.000]***Age-0.059[0.000]***-0.119[0.000]***

Sales

0.113
[0.000]***0.101[0.001]***

Yes
Yes
Yes

Yes
Yes
Yes

0.1032
1,216,415

0.0987150,328

Industry FE
Provincial FE
Year FE
Pseudo R-squared
Observations

Notes: The dependent variable is a dummy variable indicating the year when a firm starts
to export. *, **, and *** indicate significance at the 10%, 5%, and 1% levels,
respectively. All regressions include a full set of industry, province, and year dummies. Pvalues are in brackets, are based on Huber-White heteroskedasticity-consistent standard
error, and are corrected for industry-province clustering.

Table A3: Propensity Score Matching Results of Capital Intensity ln(K/L) (1999-2007)

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

-0.051-0.017-0.055-0.077-0.051-0.061-0.071[0.053]* [0.048]** [0.024]**[0.152][0.020]**[0.024]**[0.031]**-0.046

Panel A: DID Matching-0.086-0.054[0.009]*** [0.005]***

Panel B: Local Linear Regression Matching-0.062-0.051-0.029-0.028-0.093-0.065-0.032[0.021]** [0.030]** [0.034]**[0.066]*[0.014]**[0.031]**-0.024-0.074-0.064-0.070-0.052-0.069[0.016]** [0.040]** [0.029]** [0.046]**[0.045]**[0.011]**[0.027]**[0.012]**[0.082]*[0.035]*** [0.009]***-0.018[0.087]*

Panel C: Nearest Neighbor Matching-0.085-0.054-0.057

Notes: This table examines the impact of exporting on capital intensity by year, using three different propensity score matching
methods to compare exporters' ex-post capital intensity with that of non-exporters. P-values, based on bootstrapped standard errors
are reported in brackets. *, **, and *** indicate significance at the 10%, 5%, and 1% levels, respectively.

Table A4: Information about merging the industrial firm survey (NBS) data withcustoms Data

Num. of Exporters Num. of Exporters in Num. of Matchedin Customs Data
NBS Data
Firms

Share of Matched Firms
in Total Export Value
Reported by Customs

2000

62,77136,88819,7330.37

2001

68,07240,12822,9040.39

2002

78,61245,00425,9940.41

2003

95,62950,59429,7890.42

2004

120,589

76,59346,0100.49

2005

144,030

74,38848,5520.47

2006

171,205

78,20652,3240.45

Notes: Firms from the two date sets are merged by firm names and other information. The first column
lists the number of exporters reported in the customs data set; the second column lists the number ofexporters reported in the NBS firm data. The numbers are consistently larger in the second column because
the customs data set covers the universe of exporters, including trade intermediary firms. The NBS data set
includes the above-scale firms that have over 5 million RMB sales revenue in the sample year. The thirdcolumn reports the number of merged firms. The last column reports the share of exports attributable to thematched firms.

Table A5: An Example of HS-6 Products within an Industry
64 FOOTWEAR, GAITERS, & THE LIKE
640110 Waterproof footwear incorporating a protective metal toe-cap...
640191 Waterproof footwear covering the knee...
640192 Waterproof footwear covering the ankle but not the knee
640199 Waterproof footwear (not covering the ankle)
640212 Ski-boots & cross-country ski footwear of rubber or plastics
640219 Sport footwear, nes, of rubber or plastics
640220 Footwear with thongs plugged into soles, of rubber or plastics
640230 Footwear, with metal toe-cap, of rubber or plastics
640291 Footwear, nes, covering the ankle of rubber or plastics
640299 Footwear, nes, not covering the ankle, of rubber or plastics
640312 Ski-boots, etc, with rubber/plastics/leather.. soles, leather uppers
640319 Sports footwear, with rubber/plastics/leather..soles, leather uppers
640320 Sandles, with leather soles & straps (over instep, around big toe)640330 Footwear with a wood base, no inner soles or caps, leather uppers
640340 Footwear, with a metal toe-cap, leather uppers
640351 Footwear with leather soles & uppers, covering the ankle
640359 Footwear with leather soles & uppers, not covering the ankle
640391 Footwear with rubber... soles & leather uppers, covering the ankle
640399 Footwear with rubber... soles, leather uppers, not coverng the ankle
640411 Sports footwear,with rubber or plastic soles & textile uppers
640419 Other footwear,with rubber or plastic soles & textile uppers
640420 Footwear with leather or composition leather soles & textile uppers
640510 Footwear, nes, with leather or composition leather uppers
640520 Footwear, nes, with textile uppers
640590 Footwear, nes
640610 Uppers & parts thereof (excl. stiffeners)
640620 Outer soles & heels of rubber or plastics
640691 Wooden parts of footwear (excl. uppers, outer soles & heels)
640699 Non-wood parts of footwear (excl. uppers, outer soles & heels)

Table A6: Capital Intensity by Sector (2001)
SectorAnimals & Animal Products
Vegetable Products
Animal Or Vegetable Fats
Prepared Foodstuffs
Mineral Products
Chemical Products
Plastics & Rubber
Hides & Skins
Wood & Wood Products
Wood Pulp Products
Textiles & Textile Articles
Footwear, Headgear
Articles Of Stone, Plaster, Cement, Asbestos
Pearls, Precious Or Semi-Precious Stones, Metals
Base Metals & Articles Thereof
Machinery & Mechanical Appliances
Transportation Equipment
Instruments - Measuring, MusicalArms & Ammunition
Miscellaneous
Works Of Art

HS 2-digit
codes

Num. of HS-6
products

01-05
06-14
15
16-24
25-27
28-38
39-40
41-43
44-46
47-49
50-63
64-67
68-70
71
72-83
84-85
86-89
90-92
93
94-96
97-99

174
254
35
173
134
764
198
62
75
147
818
55
147
41
563
792
121
235
10
130
9

Capital Intensity Capital Intensity(mean)(St Dev)
70.9
71.8
64.9
94.6
90.1
111.6
79.6
45.5
62.3
93.7
68.1
27.8
72.2
32.1
93.9
99.2
107.2
99.6
152.4
47.8
30.7

56.9
61.1
63.3
69.0
70.9
66.5
65.2
47.0
56.5
66.8
54.9
43.0
64.9
59.5
63.5
63.9
66.8
62.8
69.9
51.5
53.2

Notes: The unit is throusand yuan (RMB) per worker. We estimate the capital intensity of HS6 products using themerged data set. This table shows the summary statistics of capital intensity by broad sectors. See Appendix A.3 for theprocedure to compute capital intensity at the HS 6-digit level.