An Investigation of U.S. States High-Tech, Low-Tech, and Total Manufacturing Export Performance in the Asian Market

Abstract

Asia is the most populous continent and has fast become one of the richestand fastest growing continents. It is thus a vital market that is likely to become even moreimportant in the future. Using panel data of three different types of manufacturing exportsincluding high-tech, low-tech, and total exports, this study estimates the exportperformance of the 48 contiguous U.S. states in the Asian export market, represented by24 Asian countries. The study also seeks to investigate what determines whether a stateunder or over performs in each of the manufacturing export categories to the Asianmarket. Our results indicate that a state's business vitality, manufacturing union density,legal system, pollution abatement cost, employment density, and regional locationsignificantly impact whether the state will under or over perform its potential for all thethree types of exports in the Asian market. Our results also indicate that some of thevariables noted above have different impacts on the state's high-tech and low-tech exportperformances. Further, our results show that there are regional differences in the impactof the growth of Chinese exports on U.S. state exports to the Asian region. (F10, R11)