The paper uses longitudinal Bureau of Census data on establishments included in the 1988 Survey of Manufacturing Technology to identify and characterize plants that display persistently rapid employment growth across 1977-1987 (i.e., "Heroic Plants"). Such plants account for roughly 25% of total...

Heroic Plant research shows that persistently-rapid job creation by a select group of plants can be an important source of overall employment growth in manufacturing. Establishments in SICs 34 - 38 whose residual growth (after controlling for differences in plant age, size, industry, etc.) ranks...

Previous research shows that both exporting and the use of advanced technologies independently enhance the performance of U.S. manufacturing plants in a variety of ways. The research presented below shows that plants that both export and use advanced technology outperform other plants in a...