The authors analyze the determinants of firm productivity in a group of Mexican firms. In particular, they test the … important proximate source of productivity-access to informal networks. Interaction in the form of "business lunches" with local … firm's productivity. Access to regulators and agents of backward and forward linkages are important in settings where …

longitudinal plant-level data covering all of Mexico from 2005–2010, and using an instrumental variable strategy that exploits … plausibly exogenous spatiotemporal variation in the homicide rate during the outbreak of drug-trade related violence in Mexico … violence has significant distortive effects on domestic industrial development in Mexico and shed light on the characteristics …