The Impact of Globalization on Economic

Growth
BY JUSTIN KUEPPER Updated November 19, 2018

Globalization has impacted nearly every aspect of modern life. While some U.S. citizens may not be able
to locate Beijing, China on a map, they certainly purchase an overwhelming number of goods that were
manufactured there.

According to a 2010 Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco report, approximately 35.6 percent of all
clothing and shoes sold in the United States were actually manufactured in China, compared to just 3.4
percent made domestically. Below is a look beyond the everyday implications of globalization and
towards the economic implications that impact international investors.

Globalization Benefits World Economies

Most economists agree that globalization provides a net benefit to individual economies around the
world, by making markets more efficient, increasing competition, limiting military conflicts, and
spreading wealth more equally around the world.

However, the general public tends to assume that the costs associated with globalization outweigh the
benefits, especially in the short-term, which has caused problems we’ll explore in the next section on
protectionism

The Milken Institute’s Globalization of the World Economy report highlights many of the benefits
associated with globalization while outlining some of the associated risks that governments and
investors should consider.

But, in aggregate, there is a consensus among economists that globalization provides a net benefit to
nations around the world and therefore should be embraced on the whole by governments and
individuals. Some of the benefits of globalization include:

Foreign Direct Investment. Foreign direct investment (“FDI”) tends to increase at a much greater rate
than the growth in world trade, helping boost technology transfer, industrial restructuring, and the
growth of global companies.

Technological Innovation. Increased competition from globalization helps stimulate new technology
development, particularly with the growth in FDI, which helps improve economic output by making
processes more efficient.

Economies of Scale. Globalization enables large companies to realize economies of scale that reduce
costs and prices, which in turn supports further economic growth, although this can hurt many small
businesses attempting to compete domestically.
Some of the risks of globalization include:

Interdependence. Globalization leads to the interdependence between nations, which could cause
regional or global instabilities if local economic fluctuations end up impacting a large number of
countries relying on them.

National Sovereignty. Some see the rise of nation-states, multinational or global firms and other
international organizations as a threat to sovereignty. Ultimately, this could cause some leaders to
become nationalistic or xenophobic.

Equity Distribution. The benefits of globalization can be unfairly skewed towards rich nations or
individuals, creating greater inequalities and leading to potential conflicts both nationally and
internationally as a result.

Tariffs & Other Forms of Protectionism

The 2008 economic crisis led many politicians to question the merits of globalization. Since then, global
capital flows fell from $11 trillion in 2007 to a third of that figure in 2012. While some of that may be
cyclical in nature, many countries implemented tariffs and other forms of protectionism designed to
contain risk in their financial systems and make crises less damaging, although this comes at the cost of
forgoing the benefits we’ve seen.

In the U.S. and Europe, new banking regulations were introduced that limited capital flows in order to
reduce the risk of contagion. Tariffs have also been put in place to protect domestic industries seen as
vital, such as the 127% U.S. tariff on Chinese paper clips or Japan’s 778% tariff on imported rice. In
developing countries, these figures are even worse, with Brazil’s tariffs being some four times higher
than America’s and three times higher than China’s.

The election of Donald Trump in the United States and the British vote to leave the European Union -
known as the 'Brexit' - have also contributed to the anti-globalization movement. These trends have
been driven by anti-immigration sentiments in Europe, although elections occurring in the past year
have proven to be largely pro-globalization rather than anti-globalization.

Globalization may be inevitable over the long-run, but there are many bumps along the road in the
short-run. These bumps are often spurred by economic crises or some of the negative consequences of
globalization, but in the end, the world has always managed to learn that protectionism can make a bad
situation worse.

The Bottom Line

Globalization has impacted nearly every aspect of modern life and continues to be a growing force in the
global economy. While there are a few drawbacks to globalization, most economists agree that it's a
force that's both unstoppable and net beneficial to the world economy. There have always been periods
of protectionism and nationalism in the past, but globalization continues to be the most widely accepted
solution to ensuring consistent economic growth around the world.