Merger and the returns to labour and investment

Abstract

Manufacturing industries with high merger intensities have higher value-added of about 10% after taking into account the number of employees and the amount of new investment. Merger-intensive industries are also more investment-intensive, and they have higher value-added per employee. These findings support the view that mergers in manufacturing serve to transfer intangible capital and to allow low-cost solutions to the problem of developing and ultimately deploying assets.