Multinational corporations are the most productive firms in the global economy. The question of why multinationals operate efficiently across many countries is still open and puzzling.One potential explanation for their productivity advantage across borders is the intangible transfers within multinational firms. Examples of measurable intangible transfers include spillovers from R&D investment (Bilir & Morales, 2020) and the transplantation of the organizational structure (Marin et al., 2013). Important theoretical work has featured intangible transfers within multinationals (e.g., Markusen, 1984). Implicitly, the assumption that more productive firms can transplant their productivity advantage to their affiliates abroad has already been featured in models of foreign direct investment (e.g.,

What effect did trade have on the size distribution of firms during the first wave of globalization? Three historical datasets from the German Empire between 1875 and 1907 were collected and harmonized to answer this question. This paper combines industry census and bilateral railway trade data from the same industry and region along with industry-level tariff data. The evidence shows that increases in aggregate trade caused the share of firms to shift from smaller to larger firms. Exogenous decreases in tariffs caused an increase in the share of the largest firms. The regional distributive effects of trade on inequality between firms that are discussed in the contemporaneous literature were already present during the first wave globalization.

Seminars are an important channel through which researchers receive feedback on their work and disseminate it. This paper presents descriptive evidence on the representation of female, male, and mixed teams in economics seminars. I use a balanced panel of 270 institutions in the academic years 2018-2020. I find that before COVID-19, only 7.4 percent of presented projects were authored by female teams, 59.2 percent of projects were authored by male teams, and 33.5 percent of projects were authored by mixed teams. The introduction of virtual seminars during the COVID-19 pandemic led to more balanced distribution across team types.

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