An Empirical Analysis of Product Concentration and Income in High-Technology Exports

Abstract

Concentration on exports is important in terms of the contribution of exports to sustainable economic growth and income level. Therefore, literature researching the relationship between export concentration and income has emerged. However, the relationship in question has not yet been extensively analyzed concerning high-technology exports. The current study investigates the product concentration/diversification at the high-technology level, which has made it a pioneering study and the validity of the resource curse hypothesis for the high-technology sector. The findings obtained by panel data econometrics in a sample from 1988 to 2017 in 49 countries show that the U-shaped relationship put forward for general exports does not apply to high-technology (HT) exports. There is no diversification curve between HT-export concentration and income. However, the driver of diversification in HT exports has been found to be income level. As income levels increase, countries can diversify HT products. Besides, natural resource wealth is not a hindrance to the diversification of HT exports; instead it contributes to diversification. This finding suggests that resource abundance does not exclude technological progress and knowledge economy activities. As control variables, country scale and trade volume indicators contribute positively to HT concentration. This result contradicts the literature put forward on general export.