This note proposes the continuous treatment approach as a valuable alternative to propensity score matching for evaluating economic effects of merger and acquisitions (M&As). This framework allows considering the variation in treatment intensities explicitly, and it does not call for an arbitrary definition of cutoff values in traded ownership shares to construct a binary treatment indicator. We demonstrate the usefulness of this approach using data from European M&As and by relying on the example of post-M&A employment effects. The empirical exercise reveals some heterogeneities over the whole distribution of acquired ownership shares and across different types of M&As and country groups.

Thesis states there are 128 pages. However, only 126 pages provided. (chronological from 1-126) / The purpose of this thesis is to examine foreign firms' spatial economic impacts on Canada with particular emphasis on the industrial linkage and spatial employment effects. The thesis focuses on the recent characteristics and strategies of foreign firms, which include rationalization and restructuring, in Canada. FDI in Canada is decreasing in a relative sense, while the share of foreign control and ownership in Canadian industry have remained almost constant for last twenty years: about sixty per cent and fifty per cent in the manufacturing sector, respectively. Furthermore, foreign firms recently increases acquisitions of Canadian firms, disinvestment from Canada, and remittance to the home countries in the form of royalties and license fees. Foreign firms seem to have contributed to the deficit of international balance of payments in Canada. Also foreign control over the Canadian economy is increasing without a corresponding increase in new capacity, income and employment. The linkage analysis and Spearman's rank correlation analysis reveal that foreign investments in Canada prefer to concentrate in industries with lower backward linkages and higher forward linkages. Foreign firms in Canada heavily depend upon foreign sources of material inputs and are directed to Canadian market for their outputs. This indicates that foreign firms' role in Canadian international balance could be negative. Along with decreasing rate of growth of FDI in Canada the employment of foreign firms has decreased rapidly, while their spatial concentration has increased. In addition, the rapid decrease in foreign employment in Canada's lagging regions since 1970 also contributed to regional disparity. For the locational change over the last two decades, domestic firms have been more dispersed out of Ontario and Quebec than foreign firms. Foreign firms were more stable then domestic firms implying that they specialized themselves in the plant level to cope with the changes in economic climates while domestic firms might have adjusted themselves possibly by relocation and plant closures and new set ups. Foreign firms have positively influenced some parts of Canada's competitiveness through rapid specialization and productivity growth and have negatively influenced some parts of Canada's competitiveness, including the tendency toward importing, weak development in high-technology industries, less R & D activity and employment. The rapid specialization and productivity growth of foreign firms can contribute to enhance Canada's competitiveness at the expense of employment loss and regional disparity. In addition, considering Canada's poor performance in high-technologysectors and R&D activity in spite of the fact that foreign firms show rapid specialization, productivity growth, and growth in high-technology sectors, the spillover effects of foreign firms are not so satisfactory as expected in Canada. / Thesis / Master of Arts (MA)

In der vorliegenden Diplomarbeit wird untersucht welche Wirkungen der Industriegüterhandel auf die Beschäftigung im Verarbeitenden Gewerbe Indiens hat. Dazu werden die Implikationen der handelstheoretischen Modelle der Neoklassik, der Neuen sowie der Neu-Neuen Handelstheorie abgeleitet und erörtert. Es schließt sich eine empirische Analyse an, die sich an Jenkins und Sen (2006) orientiert. Dabei werden zunächst der Faktorgehalt sowie die Handelsstruktur analysiert. Um die Beschäftigungseffekte zu quantifizieren, erfolgt eine Zerlegung des Beschäftigungswachstums. Es wird auch untersucht, inwiefern die handelsinduzierte Wettbewerbsintensivierung zu einem effizienteren Arbeitseinsatz geführt hat. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass die handelsinduzierten Beschäftigungseffekte im Beobachtungszeitraum zwar positiv, aber vergleichsweise gering ausgefallen sind. Gleichzeitig wirkt sich die Entwicklung der Handelsstruktur zunehmend negativ auf das potentielle Beschäftigungswachstum aus, sodass auf Basis der hier gewonnenen Erkenntnisse nicht davon auszugehen ist, dass zukünftige Handelsflüsse einen signifikanten Beitrag zur Schaffung neuer Beschäftigungsmöglichkeiten leisten können. / This paper investigates the employment effects of trade in the manufacturing sector in India. In a first step the theoretical implications of different trade theories, including the Neoclassical, the New and the New-New trade theory, are discussed. The employment effects are then analyzed from an empirical perspective, where the approach is taken from Jenkins and Sen (2006). The analysis comprises a factor content analysis of trade flows and a decomposition of employment growth. It is also examined whether the trade induced increase in competition has led to a more efficient use of labor. The results show, that the employment effects have been positive over the whole observation period. However, they are comparatively small. Additionally, the development of the trade structure lowers the potential of trade induced employment growth. Based on these results, it can be concluded that future trade flows will not significantly help to create new jobs in the manufacturing sector in India.

Syftet med denna undersökning har varit att studera vad RUT-avdragets införande 2007 har inneburit för anställda inom befintliga svenska aktiebolag inom RUT-branschen. RUTavdraget är en skattesubvention som innebär att privatpersoner kan få hushållsnära tjänster utförda till ett reducerat pris. Undersökningen har gjorts genom att empiriskt studera hur genomsnittlig lönesumma per anställd och genomsnittligt antal anställda i befintliga svenska aktiebolag har förändrats inom RUT-branschen mellan åren 2006 och 2008, allt annat lika. För att studera detta användes en difference-in-difference-metod med fixa effekter och robusta standardfel. Datamaterialet som användes till undersökningen var bokföringsdata från aktiebolag som samlats in av PAR. I undersökningen ingick 2 506 företag inom RUTbranschen och totalt 74 798 observationer. Resultatet visar att i genomsnitt har det inom de befintliga aktiebolagen inom branschen skapats 1,4 nya jobb per företag och årslönerna för de anställda i dessa företag har i genomsnitt ökat med 10 931 kronor per anställd. Totalt innebär det att 3 065 nya jobb har skapats i dessa befintliga aktiebolag, vilket kan sättas i relation till tidigare undersökningar som visat att den totala ökningen av antal anställda i genomsnitt varit ca 5 700 personer. Tidigare har inte löneeffekter till följd av RUT-avdraget studerats, vilket innebär att detta arbete bidrar med ny forskning inom ett område som inte studerats tidigare. / The purpose of this thesis has been to study what the introduction of the RUT deduction 2007 has meant for employees in existing Swedish limited companies in the RUT industry. The RUT deduction is a tax subsidy that allows the public to buy household services at a reduced price. The study has been conducted by empirically studying how average wages per employee and average number of employees in existing Swedish limited companies have changed within the RUT industry between 2006 and 2008, ceteris paribus. For this, a Difference-in-Difference method was used with fixed effects and robust standard errors. The data used for the study was accounting data from companies, collected by PAR. The dataset consisted of 2,506 companies in the RUT industry and a total of 74,798 observations. The result shows that on average, within the existing companies in the industry, 1.4 new jobs have been created per company and the annual salary for employees in these companies has increased by an average of SEK 10,931 per employee. In total, 3,065 new jobs have been created in these existing limited companies, which can be compared with previous studies where the average number of employees on average was approximately 5,700. Previously, wage effects resulting from the RUT deduction have not been studied, which means that this work contributes to new research in a previously unexplored area.

This is a study of innovation in Knowledge Intensive Business Services (KIBS) and the impact innovation has on employment. The thesis relies on theories within the fields of "innovation in services", in particular KIBS, and "innovation and employment", taking as its point of departure the taxonomy of product and process innovation. The thesis is based on a discussion of innovation in services with a focus on how innovation in services may be understood and delineated. A long discussion is dedicated to the taxonomy of product and process innovation and the extent to which these concepts may be applicable to innovation in services. The thesis also scrutinises the concept of KIBS and how this can be defined. It further discusses features commonly associated with KIBS firms. The thesis is also rooted in the broader issue of innovation as a creator and destroyer of employment and makes a contribution in applying these issues to service sectors. The empirical part of the thesis builds on a database compiled for the research project, comprised of 967 Swedish KIBS firms. The database covers issues of innovation, employment and characteristics of the firm. The findings indicate that innovation was common in Swedish KIBS firms and that innovations often had an impact on employment. However, the thesis did not detect a straightforward relation between type of innovation (technological process innovation, organisational process innovation, goods product innovation and service product innovation) and the impact on employment. Explanations other than type of innovation have to be considered to analyse the impact of innovation on employment. The thesis further suggests that although innovation in KIBS is common, innovation itself is difficult to conceptualise and delineate.