This paper uses industry and province specific Chinese industrial data to demonstrate a potential causal link between two strands of the FDI literature. The first strand suggests that the impact of spillovers from inward FDI is less robust in middle-income economies than in either high-income or low-income economies. The second strand suggests diminishing returns of inward FDI on horizontal labor productivity in low-technology industries but not in high-technology industries. This paper suggests a link between these two phenomena. Specifically, if both FDI intensity and industry mix vary with the level of economic development, then an industry-dependent relationship between inward FDI and horizontal spillovers could cause middle-income economies to derive fewer benefits from inward FDI than either high- or low-income economies. This paper also verifies the curvilinear relationship between FDI in low-technology industries and horizontal labor productivity without relying on problematic FDI from Hong Kong, Taiwan and Macao.
. [J]. Frontiers of Economics in China, 2013, 8(4): 535-551.
William M. Tracy. Industry Mix and Curvilinear Spillovers from FDI in China. Front. Econ. China, 2013, 8(4): 535-551.