Search Results
Journal Article
Border benefits from Mexican shoppers
Journal Article
Mexican migrants stay in border comfort zone
Limited access to migrant networks and strong geographic preferences may underlie border migrants' willingness to settle for lower wages on the border rather than seek higher wages by venturing into the U.S. interior.
Journal Article
The maquiladora's changing geography
A lack of data has limited our understanding of the distribution of maquiladora activity. Recently, Mexico's chief statistical agency provided previously unpublished information that will allow us to draw a more detailed portrait. ; We take a preliminary look at where specific maquiladora activities take place within Mexico. Then we examine changes in location since 1990, finding that the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and other trade pacts have been the most important factors reshaping patterns of maquiladora employment.
Journal Article
El Paso economy sluggish in 2007: U.S. slowdown outweighs Fort Bliss expansion
This has been a disappointing year for El Paso in terms of job growth. Through October, the city added only 1,200 new wage and salary jobs, according to seasonally adjusted data, an annualized growth rate of less than 1 percent. The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate remained at a historically low level of 5.4 percent in October, but progress in lowering the rate further stalled at midyear.
Journal Article
Is the recession over in El Paso?
In December 2007, the U.S. economy entered a mild recession, a downturn that would ultimately trigger the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression and a fall into one of the longest and deepest recessions of the past 60 years. Growth returned to the U.S. in mid-2009 but remains too slow to make inroads into stubbornly high unemployment. Virtually no geographic area of the country was left untouched by the U.S. downturn, including El Paso, although the local economy performed much better than other border cities, such as McAllen, Brownsville and Laredo. Government-related spending, ...
Speech
The U.S., Mexican, and border economies
Remarks before a Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas Community Luncheon, Laredo, Texas, September 10, 2007. ; "It is fair to say that I am encouraged by what I have heard against a background of constant negative speculation and the occasional discordant note, such as last week's employment numbers. Our economy appears to be weathering the storm thus far. The future path of that storm and the appropriate policy course, however, are still to be determined."
Discussion Paper
Analyzing the export flow from Texas to Mexico
From 1997 to 2008, Texas shipped 40 percent of its manufacturing exports to Mexico. This puts Texas-Mexico among the largest state-country trading relationships. But this share has been declining recently. A gravity equation cannot account for either of these facts, even though Texas and Mexico share a border. This positive contiguity effect is not unique in state export data. I study the features of the Texas-Mexico relationship to try to account for the size of the export flow and the recent decline in share. Data limitations prevent a full accounting, but the most likely feature is the ...
Journal Article
Globalizing Texas: direct investment and business cycles
Hundreds of foreign companies, employing almost 400,000 workers, have put down roots in Texas. The highest concentration of jobs is in manufacturing, but more foreign firms are finding their way into services. ; Early this decade, Texas exceeded the nation in attracting foreign direct investment (FDI) assets, but the state has since lost its edge. Its FDI-related employment as a share of overall jobs ranks in the middle of the pack. ; In the September/October issue of> Southwest Economy, an article on globalizing Texas focused on export growth and related employment, including jobs in high ...
Journal Article
Noteworthy: south Texas: recession taking toll on shipments across border
Recessions in both the U.S. and Mexico have slowed the flow of goods across the Rio Grande.
Journal Article
Spotlight: maquiladora employment: new data confirm pickup in Juarez factory jobs
For decades, Mexico's maquiladoras have been a major growth engine in the Rio Grande region, and monthly reports on the industry's employment, wages and production were key barometers for the border region's economy. ; We developed a model to estimate Juarez's monthly maquiladora employment. This model will continue to be a timely indicator of El Paso-Jurez area manufacturing activity, given its track record and Mexico's two-month lag in reporting IMMEX (Maquiladora Manufacturing Industry and Export Services), data.