Mergers and Acquisitions
Explore this page to learn more about the analysis that we have undertaken in the trades sectors (i.e. manufacturing, construction, and utilities).
The analysis combines data from Moody's on Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A) using broad NAICS 2-digit codes to select three sectors that we have define as trades.
Our identification: M&A activity can affect the labor market in unintended ways through events such as consolidating firms, eliminating redundant positions, or shifting operations, potentially decreasing employment and wages.
To conduct the work on this project, we use multiple data sources: (1) Moody’s Orbis, (2) Census LEHD, and (3) publicly available covariates (see Table 1).
(1) The M&A data comes from the Moody's Orbis M&A dataset, which provides individual deal records. We geocode target firm addresses to assign FIPS codes.
(2) The employment data comes from the Census Bureau’s Longitudinal Employer-Household Dynamics (LEHD) Workplace Area Characteristics (WAC) files.
(3) This table provides the covariates and their data sources used in the model.
Data Notes and Details:
(1) We construct a balanced panel of 3,010 counties over 20 years (2004– 2023).
(2) We drop observations from the District of Columbia, Alaska, Hawaii, Massachusetts, and Michigan due to incomplete LEHD coverage.
(3) Counties are classified as "ever-treated" if they experienced at least one completed trades-sector M&A deal during the study period.
(4) We define the skilled trades sector as composed of construction, manufacturing, and utilities jobs.
This project looks at the impact of mergers and acquisitions on labor market outcomes, including employment and wages. In particular, the project evaluates across specific sectors whether a merger or acquisition in a county-year leads to employment consolidation in the subsequent years.
Figure 1. Baseline Event Study for First Trade Sector M&A in a county-year without covariates.
From Figure 1, we see that the pre-trends in the event study are stable and that the 1st Trade Sector M&A event reduces the share of employment in trades by 1 percentage point, a reduction sustained over time.
Figure 2. Event Study for First Trade Sector M&A in a county-year with covariates.
From Figure 2, we see that pre-trends remain stable after the inclusion of covariates and that the 1st Trade Sector M&A effect is robust to county-level covariates in the model.
Project Poster
Presented at the 2026 Kansas Data Science Consortium Conference
