This paper examines how Social Security eligibility shapes the poverty consequences of the China trade shock across 722 U.S. commuting zones, using a stacked long-difference design over 1990–2000 and 2000–2007 and instrumenting U.S. import exposure with Chinese import growth in eight other high-income countries. It builds cohort-level outcomes from the 1990 and 2000 Censuses and the 2007 ACS and decomposes labor force nonparticipation into three mutually exclusive channels: exit with Social Security income, with private pension income only, and with neither. The cohort reaching age 62 during the shock (born 1939–1948) has the largest employment loss but no rise in poverty, as Social Security receipt rises by 0.59 points. The cohort still below 62 (born 1949–1958) has a comparable employment loss but more exits without retirement income and a 0.57-point rise in poverty, larger among women. Private-pension-only exit does not respond in any cohort.

This paper examines whether the concentration of high-tech manufacturing moderates the labor market effects of Chinese import competition across 722 U.S. commuting zones over 1990–2019. Commuting zones in the top quartile of 1990 employment share in computer, communication, and electrical equipment industries are classified as high-tech, and separate instrumental-variable regressions are estimated for high-tech and low-tech zones. During 1990–2010, import exposure reduced local employment and population in both groups, but the estimated effects per unit of exposure in high-tech zones were roughly half those in low-tech zones. Over 2010–2019, effects in high-tech zones are statistically insignificant, while low-tech zones show continued declines in employment, population, wages, and housing values. Within low-tech zones, non-college workers experience further losses in employment and housing values, whereas college-educated workers experience declines in wages and housing values. In low-tech zones, Black workers face persistent employment and population losses, and Hispanic and Asian workers experience the largest declines in housing values. The findings suggest that adjustment remained incomplete a decade after the shock in zones without an established high-tech base, and speak to debates on place-based industrial policy, including the CHIPS and Science Act of 2022.

This paper studies how local import competition affects employment, nonparticipation by income source, and family poverty. I compare three birth cohorts that reach age 62, the early eligibility age for Social Security retirement benefits, in different decades. Using Census and American Community Survey data for U.S. commuting zones, with exposure to Chinese imports instrumented by Chinese imports in eight other high-income countries, I decompose nonparticipation into Social Security only, private pension only, both, or neither. During 1990–2010, estimated employment declines are similar across cohorts. Poverty does not rise significantly in the oldest cohort, in which nonparticipation with retirement income rises, but it rises in the two younger cohorts. The estimate for nonparticipation with no retirement income is largest in the youngest cohort, and I reject equality across cohorts for both poverty and this measure. These patterns are consistent with access to retirement benefits limiting the poverty consequences of employment losses. During 2010–2019, however, poverty does not fall significantly in the cohort most of whose members reach age 62 in that period.