Policy Forum: Foreign Direct Investment In OECD Countries Editorial Note
这篇编辑说明介绍了经合组织国家外国直接投资政策论坛的背景，指出跨境投资增长快于贸易，并概述了Barrell和Pain关于FDI对欧洲经济增长影响的研究，发现FDI有积极作用但与出口负相关。
Globalisation is a widely used, maybe overused, term which means different things to different people. In general it refers to the increase in cross‐border commercial activity which has been such a striking feature of the post World War II period. It is tempting to think of this only in terms of arm's length trade, but this would be a mistake. Much of the growth in trade which has occurred is intra‐firm trade and cross‐border investment is growing more rapidly than international trade. Economists have long been interested in foreign direct investment (FDI) – motivations for it; whether direct investment substitutes for or complements trade; whether active policy has a real impact on FDI flows; and the economic effects of those flows. This Policy Forum is directed at the last of these. In the first paper Barrell and Pain look at the factors behind economic growth in Europe, in order to focus on the role of FDI. They begin by reviewing some of the motives behind overseas investment and find that the characteristics of host countries do appear to influence the types of investment they receive. For instance, the United Kingdom has tended to attract relatively labour intensive activities following a period of labour market reforms whilst Germany has been more successful in attracting investment in sectors where innovations have been growing most rapidly. They then include FDI in a formal analysis of growth and report evidence of a positive effect, though it is by no means the only factor behind the growth of technical progress or total factor productivity. Finally they look at the links between FDI and exports and report a negative relationship between outward investment and net trade performance. They caution, however, against taking this as evidence of a job exporting effect.