Is there a quality-upgrading wage premium?

Abstract

This paper analyses the existence of a quality-upgrading wage premium at the firm level and its connection with the exporting wage premium. Producing a higher quality product increases the likelihood of exporting and can activate a learning-by-exporting mechanism. In turn, higher quality products require employing more-skilled labour, thereby leading to higher wages. Using a methodology similar to that proposed by Schank et al. (2010), I test whether firms that increase their product quality pay higher wages (the learning- by-quality-upgrading hypothesis) or, conversely, if firms with higher productivity, as proxied by their higher wages, are more likely to increase the quality of their output (self-selection hypothesis).