TY  - JOUR
AU  - Klein,Michael W.
AU  - Moser,Christoph
AU  - Urban,Dieter M.
TI  - The Contribution of Trade to Wage Inequality: The Role of Skill, Gender, and Nationality
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 15985
PY  - 2010
Y2  - May 2010
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w15985
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w15985.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Michael W. Klein
Fletcher School
Tufts University
Medford, MA 02155
Tel: (617) 627-2718
Fax: (617) 627-3712
E-Mail: michael.klein@tufts.edu

Christoph Moser
ETH Zurich
KOF Swiss Economic Institute
8092 Zurich, Switzerland
E-Mail: moser@kof.ethz.ch

Dieter Urban
Faculty of Business and Economics
RWTH Aachen University
Templergraben 64
52062 Aachen, Germany
E-Mail: dieter.urban@wiwi.rwth-aachen.de
AB  - International trade has been cited as a source of widening wage inequality in industrial nations.  Consistent with this claim, we find a significant export wage premium for high-skilled workers in German manufacturing and an export wage discount for lower skilled workers, using matched employer-employee data.  Estimates suggest that the export wage premium to high-skilled workers represents up to one third of their overall skill premium. But, while an increase in exports increases wage inequality along the dimension of skill, it diminishes the wage inequality associated with both gender and nationality.  In this way, trade contributes to narrowing wage gaps and mitigating wage inequality in German manufacturing.
ER  -