Real appreciation

Karolina Ekholm, Andreas Moxnes and Karen-Helene Ullveit-Moe look at the effect of the 17% real appreciation of the Norwegian Krone in the 2000 to 2001 period. Using micro data of the performance of Nowegian firms, they find three things:

First, the real exchange rate shock was associated with substantial employment losses. One-seventh of the total decline in manufacturing employment over the period under study can be attributed to the real appreciation.

Second, the shock led to productivity gains at the firm level, indicating that the most exposed firms were able to improve efficiency in a period of tougher foreign market conditions. One-fifth of the productivity improvement over the same time span can also be attributed to the real appreciation. Somewhat surprisingly, we do not find evidence of market reallocation effects; the real appreciation does not seem to have been associated with a reallocation of resources from low-productivity to high-productivity firms.

Third, firms responded to the real appreciation by offshoring (Ekholm and Ulltveit-Moe 2007), thereby purchasing a larger share of their intermediate inputs from abroad. For the manufacturing industry as a whole, the real appreciation increased the import share of intermediates by about 1.5%

This gives some insight into the costs of the Dutch disease.

Michael Veseth looks at the affect of US dollar depreciation on the US wine industry.