The Tangible Contribution of R&D Spending Foreign-Owned Plants to a Host Region: a Plant Level Study of the Irish Manufacturing Sector (1980-1996)

VI The Quantity and Quality of Employment Created

The second motive behind government policy towards expanding
R&D-active plants derives from the belief that such plants would create a
greater quantity and quality of employment than similar non-R&D-active
plants.

(A) The Quantity of Employment Created

The following tables are based on an analysis of a cohort (foreign
affiliates with ten or more employees in 1986). Overall there is net job
destruction in the cohort (11.1%) over the period 1986-1996. However
within sectors in Table 8, there is net job creation by MNC plants in the
two higher tech sectors (3.1% and 2.4%) in comparison with the net job
destruction in plants in the two lower tech sectors (-10.4% and -28.8%).

(Table 8)

It is also possible to analyse how the overall net job destruction rate
of the cohort varies according to whether the plant is or is not an R&D-
spending plant as in Table 9. Large R&D spenders have a net job creation
rate of over 12 per cent compared to the net job destruction rate of over 28
per cent for both small R&D spending and non-R&D spending plants.
R&D spend is not associated with significant net job creation unless
undertaken on a significant scale.

(Table 9)

An extension of the previous analysis is to consider those foreign
affiliates in the cohort which are alive in both 1986 and 1996. There are
496 such plants out of a total of 691. This allows us to distinguish the

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