Productivity and Patterns of Trade: The Experience of Korea in the 1990s

생산성과 무역패턴: 1990년대의 한국경제의 경험

This paper analyzes the industrial growth of Korea in the 1990s and its relationship with the nation's export performance. The result shows that total factor productivity (TFP) played a significant role in the growth of some industries, where in particular a sharp increase in TFP was observed in the electrics and electronics industry and the automobile industry in the late 1990s. While CEPII RCA indexes for the Korean industries such as IT industry and automobile industry significantly increased since 1998, only limited evidence was found that TFP or TFI influenced RCA. Investigating Korea's export performance in the Northeast Asian context, this paper shows that, in the 1990s, the growth of Korea's exports to Japan was led by industries that recorded relatively fast growth in total factor input (TFI). In contrast, that to China was almost equally contributed by industries that experienced relatively fast growth in TFP or TFI. This paper also investigates competition between Korea and China, and Korea and Japan in the world market. The competition between Korea and China was relatively stronger for the Korean industries to whose growth TFI made a more significant contribution. While no decisive evidence is found for the relationship between TFP growth in Korean industries and their competition against Japan in the world market, it is revealed that the competition between Korea and Japan became less intense for the Korean industries to whose growth TFI made a stronger contribution. In this regard, the paper supports the view of 'nut-cracking' that the Korean economy has lost its competitiveness in the sectors where it maintained comparative advantage, but failed to catch up more advanced countries such as Japan by gaining competitiveness in more capital or technology intensive sectors.

1990년대의 한국경제는 여러 가지 극적인 변화를 경험하였다. 가장 극적이었던 경제위기와 그로부터의 회복에 가려지기 쉽지만, 우리 경제가 겪은 가장 중요한 변화 중의 하나는 총요소생산성이 산업성장의 주요 동력으로 자리매김한 것이다. 본 연구는 이 기간 동안의 산업성장동력의 변화가 무역성과에 미친 영향을 특히 한국-중국-일본의 구도 속에서 분석한다. 무역성과의 분석을 위해서는 산업별 수출성과, CEPII 현시비교우위지수, 경합도 등이 사용되었다. 분석결과, 한국이 거의 모든 산업, 특히 노동집약적인 분야에서는 중국의 추격을 허용한 반면, 자본집약적이거나 기술집약적인 부문, 즉 총요소생산성의 증가가 성장을 주도한 산업에서는 일본을 극히 제한된 부문에서만 따라 잡는 것으로 나타나, 저간에 회자되는 'nut-cracking'의 우려가 1990년대부터 발생하였음을 보이고, 이로부터 벗어나는 것이 더 이상 미룰 수 없는 심각하고 시급한 과제임을 역설한다.