Are foreign-owned subsidiaries good for the United States?

More than thirty years, scholars have probed the economies, politics, and management of multinational enterprises. High on the agenda has been a search for generalizations about their impact on the countries in which they operate, especially generalizations that might be helpful in shaping national policy. However, few robust conclusions have emerged despite the burgeoning research efforts. Even when one narrows the perspective by concentrating on the US manufacturing subsidiaries of foreign-based enterprises, as I intend to do in this brief essay, the generalizations come hard. Limited theory and even more limited data place heavy restraints on the economist's capacity to prescribe.