The present study seeks to examine empirically whether exposure to international trade creates or destroys jobs for a sample of eight ASEAN+3 countries (APT). The fndings of the PMG technique shows that trade liberalization policies have a negative influence on unemployment rate in the long run. Since medium and unskilled workers are the majority of the workforce, a reduction in trade barriers is likely to expand the trading sector. For the APT countries to compete globally, the trading sector is likely to shift to a more effcient production mode by using intensive capital and high skilled labor, leaving unskilled workers unemployed. The fndings are robust since we use various proxies for the trade liberalization policies.
ISSN 0116-7111 (Print)
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