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Rising Trade and Falling Wages: A Review of the Theory and the Empirics

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Global Trade and European Workers

Abstract

Does trade impoverish unskilled workers in Western industrial countries? This is an emotive way of framing a question which has received a great deal of attention from economists in recent years: to what extent has trade with labour-abundant low-wage economies affected Western labour markets? Currently, it is imports from Asia which dominate discussions, although these issues are equally pertinent for trade with Eastern Europe, the countries of the CIS (Former Soviet Union), and Latin America. We are not the only ones to try and catch the eye in this way, Freeman (1995) rather provocatively asks: ‘are your wages being set in Beijing?’

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© 1999 Paul Brenton

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Brenton, P. (1999). Rising Trade and Falling Wages: A Review of the Theory and the Empirics. In: Brenton, P., Pelkmans, J. (eds) Global Trade and European Workers. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-27035-4_2

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