Working Paper: CEPR ID: DP9667
Authors: Philippe Martin; Thierry Mayer; Florian Mayneris
Abstract: Clusters have already been extensively shown to favor firm-level economic performance (productivity, exports, innovation etc.). However, little is known about the capacity of firms in clusters to resist economic shocks. In this paper, we analyze whether firms that agglomerate in clusters and firms that have been selected to benefit from the "competitiveness cluster'' industrial policy, implemented in France in 2005, have performed better on export markets during the recent economic turmoil. We show that, on average, both agglomeration and the cluster policy are associated with a higher survival probability of firms on export markets, and conditioning on survival, a higher growth rate of their exports. However, these effects are not stronger during the 2008-2009 crisis; if anything, the opposite is true. We then show that this weaker resilience of competitiveness cluster firms is probably due to the fact that firms in clusters are more dependent on the fate of the ``leader'', i.e. the largest exporter in the cluster.
Keywords: clusters; competitiveness clusters; crisis; exports; resilience
JEL Codes: F1; R10; R11; R12; R15
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| Competitiveness cluster membership (C38) | Higher probability of survival in export markets (F10) |
| Crisis period (H12) | Decrease in survival probability for cluster firms (L25) |
| Competitiveness cluster membership (C38) | Higher growth rate of exports (F10) |
| Crisis period (H12) | Decrease in growth rate of exports for cluster firms (F14) |