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Offshoring and Outsourcing Potentials: Evidence from German Micro‐Level Data

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World Economy

Published online on

Abstract

This paper provides two indicators that measure: (i) offshoring potentials (cross‐country geographical relocation) and (ii) outsourcing potentials (organisational relocation) separately at the level of jobs, occupations, tasks and industries. We use four waves of the BIBB/BAuA Labour Force Survey in Germany and apply principal component analysis based on a large set of potential determinants of offshoring and outsourcing derived from the literature. Our results show significant variation across these levels in the determinants of both dimensions. We provide a comprehensive empirical classification of the determinants of how easily jobs can be offshored and outsourced. This can serve as a basis for further research to investigate the economic effects of job offshoreability.