Summary Of: Tariff Reduction and Employment in Canadian Manufacturing, 1988-1994 - ARCHIVED

This article summarizes findings from the research paper entitled: Tariff Reduction and Employment in Canadian Manufacturing, 1988-1994. At the end of the 1980s, Canada and the United States reached an agreement to phase out import tariffs over a 10-year period beginning January 1st, 1989. This tariff reduction scheme was a major centre-piece of the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement (FTA). The implementation of the FTA was followed by a recession, characterized by massive job cuts in manufacturing industries, which led to suggestions that employment losses were related to the reduction of trade barriers. Research on firm output and survival (Gu, Sawchuk and Whewell, 2003; Baggs, 2004) suggests the impact of tariff changes was different across industries and across firms within industries. Using firm-level data, this study investigates the impact of reduced Canadian and U.S. tariffs on Canadian manufacturing employment. The study also asks whether the impact was heterogeneous across firms with various productivity and leverage characteristics.