Firm Exporting and Employee Benefits: First Evidence from Vietnam Manufacturing SMEs

This study examines linkages between the export participation of firms and employee benefits in terms of wages and employment quality. Based on a uniquely matched firm-worker panel dataset for 2007 and 2009, we find some evidence that export participation by firms in Vietnam has a positive impact on wages when taking into account firm characteristics alone. However, the exporter wage premium falls when both firm and worker characteristics are controlled for, and it decreases further and becomes insignificant when controlling for time-invariant unobservable factors by spell fixed effect estimation. While there are many studies on the export wage premium, the role of export participation on the quality of employment remains largely unexplored. By using a firm-level balanced panel dataset for the same period, our results suggest that export participation has a negative effect on employment quality. Nevertheless, the impact of export participation on both wages and employment quality vary greatly with respect to levels of technology.