Human Capital,scope Of Export Products,and Resource Reallocation Within The Enterprise:Evidence From China

Reoptimization of the scope of export products is an important mechanism for enterprises to respond to external shocks and realize the optimal allocation of internal resources.We examine the impact of human capital on the scope of export products of enterprises by difference-in-difference method,exploiting China’s university expansion policy in 1999 as a quasi-natural experiment and using 2000-2006 Annual Survey of Industrial Firms Database and China Customs Database.Compared with the three industries with the lowest human capital intensiveness,the three industries with the highest human capital intensiveness have reduced the scope of export products by 9.13%after the expansion of university enrollment policies,which is contrary to intuition.A series of robustness ckecks also confirmed the results.Furthermore,the increase in human capital brought about by the expansion policy has promoted the improvement of enterprise productivity.Enterprises should have expanded the scope of export products.However,the increase in human capital supply brought about by the expansion of enrollment policies relaxes the human capital constraints imposed on nonstate-owned enterprises,reduces the distortion of human capital allocation,and intensifies the degree of marketization and competition in the entire market.Therefore,the overall performance is that the scope of export products of the enterprise is reduced,and the export product structure is biased towards core products.Therefore,improving human capital is the key to high-quality trade development.Not only should we shift from relying on demographic dividends to relying on human capital dividends,we should also further break up the distorted human capital allocation and deepen the reform of factor market-oriented allocation.