Portugal policy makers consider the motor vehicle industry to be critical to the country’s economy because of its potential to offer highly skilled job opportunities and incentives for innovation and research, technology transfer, and investment, although the industry remains small by international standards. Little empirical research exists on the Portuguese motor vehicle industry, and we attempt to partially fill this void by estimating an industry cost function. We find strong evidence of scale economies, an expected result given the low industry volume. An unexpected finding is that capital and labor are complements since much of the international literature regarding the industry finds evidence they are substitutes. An exception is the German industry, and the findings here may be related to the fact that the largest Portuguese motor vehicle producer is Volkswagen AutoEuropa. The significance of this finding is that a lower price for either of these inputs would increase the quantity demanded of both of them. The future appears highly uncertain for the motor vehicle assemblers unless they can achieve sufficient synergies with component suppliers and other global motor vehicle manufacturers to become internationally competitive. The component suppliers may be able to enlarge their international markets, particularly that of Spain, because of its proximity to Portugal.

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葡萄牙汽车工业：一个不可能的梦想？

葡萄牙政策制定者认为汽车行业对该国经济至关重要，因为它具有为创新和研究、技术转让和投资提供高技能工作机会和激励措施的潜力，尽管按照国际标准，该行业仍然很小。关于葡萄牙汽车行业的实证研究很少，我们试图通过估计行业成本函数来部分填补这一空白。我们发现了规模经济的有力证据，考虑到行业数量较低，这是一个预期的结果。一个意想不到的发现是，资本和劳动力是互补的，因为有关该行业的许多国际文献都发现它们是替代品。德国工业是个例外，而这里的调查结果可能与葡萄牙最大的汽车生产商是大众 AutoEuropa 有关。这一发现的意义在于，任何一种投入的较低价格都会增加它们的需求量。除非汽车组装商能够与零部件供应商和其他全球汽车制造商实现足够的协同效应，从而具有国际竞争力，否则汽车组装商的未来似乎存在很大的不确定性。由于靠近葡萄牙，零部件供应商可能能够扩大其国际市场，尤其是西班牙市场。除非汽车组装商能够与零部件供应商和其他全球汽车制造商实现足够的协同效应，从而具有国际竞争力，否则汽车组装商的未来似乎存在很大的不确定性。由于靠近葡萄牙，零部件供应商可能能够扩大其国际市场，尤其是西班牙市场。除非汽车组装商能够与零部件供应商和其他全球汽车制造商实现足够的协同效应，从而具有国际竞争力，否则汽车组装商的未来似乎存在很大的不确定性。由于靠近葡萄牙，零部件供应商可能能够扩大其国际市场，尤其是西班牙市场。