CEPII, Recherche et Expertise sur l'economie mondiale
Market Size, Competition, and the Product Mix of Exporters


Thierry Mayer
Marc Melitz
Gianmarco Ottaviano

 Points clés :

 Résumé :
We build a theoretical model of multi-product firms that highlights how market size and geography (the market sizes of and bilateral economic distances to trading partners) affect both a firm’s exported product range and its exported product mix across market destinations (the distribution of sales across products for a given product range). We show how tougher competition in an export market induces a firm to skew its export sales towards its best performing products. We find very strong confirmation of this competitive effect for French exporters across export market destinations. Trade models based on exogenous markups cannot explain this strong significant link between destination market characteristics and the within-firm skewness of export sales (after controlling for bilateral trade costs). Theoretically, this within firm change in product mix driven by the trading environment has important repercussions on firm productivity and how it responds to changes in that trading environment.

 Mots-clés : Echelle des ventes | Concurrence | Marges | Firmes multi-produits

 JEL : F12
CEPII Working Paper
N°2011-11, May 2011

Résumés non-techniques

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 Domaines d'expertise

Commerce & Mondialisation
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