Quid Pro Quo, Knowledge Spillovers, and Industrial Quality Upgrading: Evidence from the Chinese Auto Industry
研究中国汽车产业中“技术换市场”的交换条件如何促进知识溢出和质量升级，发现合资企业的国内关联车型在质量上更接近合资伙伴，工人流动和供应商网络是溢出渠道，关联车型2001-2014年质量提升的8.3%归因于此。
This paper studies the impact of quid pro quo (technology for market access) in facilitating knowledge spillovers and quality upgrading in the Chinese automobile industry. The identification strategy exploits within-product quality variation across a rich set of quality dimensions. We find affiliated domestic automakers adopt more similar quality strengths of their joint venture partners, consistent with knowledge spillovers. Additional analysis suggests worker flows and supplier networks mediate knowledge spillovers. Knowledge spillovers due to ownership affiliation under quid pro quo contributed 8.3 percent of the quality improvement experienced by affiliated domestic models from 2001 to 2014, relative to nonaffiliated domestic models.