Growth,Real Exchange Rates and Trade Protectionism since the Financial Crisis

Existing evidence suggests that protectionist activity since the financial crisis has been muted, raising the question whether the historically well‐documented relationship between growth, real exchange rates and trade protectionism has broken down. We use a novel and comprehensive dataset that stretches beyond the traditionally considered tariff and trade defense measures to study the responsiveness of trade policies to business cycles and price competitiveness in the time period since the financial crisis. We find that the specter of protectionism has not been banished. Countries continue to pursue more trade‐restrictive policies when they experience recessions and/or when their competitiveness deteriorates. Our results suggest that the global economy continues to be exposed to the risk of a creeping return of trade protectionism.     

Import Protection Bias

Rodrik (1995) notes that trade regimes tend to be biased towards import protection, while the standard political economy models either yield no prediction on the bias of the trade regime or predict, counterfactually, a bias towards the export sector. This constitutes an important shortcoming in the political economy of trade literature. In this paper, the Grossman and Helpman (1994 ) “Protection for Sale” model is extended by adding government expenditure. This expenditure may be financed via a combination of tariff revenue and a distorting wage tax. In addition to the government expenditure, export subsidies need to be financed either via tariff revenue or a distorting wage tax. With this addition, plausible values of the model's parameters yield import protection bias.     

Economic liberalization and welfare in a model with an informal sector

The paper reexamines the conventional results relating to inflow of foreign capital, removal of protectionism and structural reform programmes, in a small open economy in terms of a two-sector general equilibrium model with an informal sector. The paper shows that in the presence of labour market distortion and a protectionist policy, inflow of foreign capital may be desirable irrespective of the pattern of trade of the economy due to its favourable impact on welfare. But the welfare implications of tariff reductions and/or structural adjustment programmes, such as deregulating the formal sector labour market, depend crucially on the economy's trade pattern. The paper provides an answer to the question as to whether in a developing economy labour market reform and tariff reform should go hand-in-hand or whether one should precede the other for welfare improvement.
JEL classification: F10, F13, F21, O17.     

政治竞争与相互直接投资

This paper investigates a basic question about the international political economy—why is international trade not free? To answer this question, we modified Grossman and Helpman (1994) by considering that interest lobbies make political contributions to both the incumbent government and the political challenger in order to influence the incumbent government’s choice of trade policy. By examining the contribution schedules under a framework of bilateral direct investments, we find that the modified Ramsey rule still holds under our setting.     

金融危机下的中美贸易摩擦与政府的有效应对——以"轮胎特保案"为视角

金融危机导致国际贸易萎缩,加剧国际市场竞争,也促使各国采取更为保守的贸易政策和措施,从而加剧国际贸易摩擦。最近发生的轮胎特保案就是由于美国奉行贸易保护主义产生的贸易摩擦。美国的贸易限制不仅直接影响到中国众多企业的生存发展,而且会对中国整个经济发展带来影响。因此,需要我们的政府、进出口企业和各种行业协会紧密配合,共同努力,这其中,政府的引导和协调起着不可替代的主导作用。     

中美贸易发展对两国政治关系的影响

在世界性金融危机的背景下,以美国为首掀起的贸易保护主义愈演愈烈,对中美贸易关系形成严峻挑战。然而,中美贸易不仅仅影响两国间的经济关系,还会对两国的政治关系造成影响。本文用理论模型证明了贸易发展有减少或抑制冲突发生的作用,同时用1995-2010年中美两国的数据证明中美贸易发展是中美政治合作的显著动因,虽然双边贸易不平衡问题对政治关系产生不利影响,但两国的贸易和政治合作仍存在长期平稳且正相关的关系。因此金融危机下中美应加强经贸合作以稳定双边关系,而非采取贸易保护主义政策进行对峙。     

Spillovers from Foreign Exporters

We develop a general equilibrium model of international trade with heterogeneous firms that accounts for productivity spillovers transmitted by foreign exporters. Everything else equal, stronger spillovers increase welfare. We embed the model framework into a trade policy scenario where countries strategically set inter‐country variable trade costs for the trading partner. In the strategic Nash‐equilibrium policy, governments trade‐off welfare gains from protectionism and those that are due to spillovers from foreign exporters. The equilibrium degree of protectionism is decreasing in the strength of the spillover. Policy coordination induces welfare gains but these gains can be hump‐shaped in the spillover strength.     

中国遭遇国际贸易摩擦的必然性与合理性研究

2008年全球性金融危机之后,贸易保护主义重新抬头,中国遭遇的国际贸易摩擦愈演愈烈。但是通过贸易理论分析和世界经济、中国经济的发展实践来看,中国遭遇国际贸易摩擦有其必然性和合理性,它是中国经济和对外贸易所处历史阶段下的必然产物,国际贸易摩擦有其存在的合理性。     

INFANT INDUSTRY AND POLITICAL ECONOMY OF TRADE PROTECTION

Abstract.  This paper introduces infant-industry considerations in political economy determination of trade protection. I build a model where the government cares about both political contributions and national welfare. A potentially beneficial high-tech industry is not viable in the country whose initial human capital is low. In the political economy equilibrium, we find that the tariff schedule will be V-shaped: it decreases initially to maintain the viability of the industry but increases thereafter as the industry expands and gains political power. We use the model to explain both China's tariff offers in WTO negotiations and GATT/WTO rules regarding developing countries.     

Protection and Liberalisation in Australia and Abroad

This article reviews changes in Australian protection policy between 1967 and 1995, particularly the political economy aspects. The story is quite complex, and until 1974 was unusual by international standards, with a sophisticated Australian tariff debate and the remarkable transparency role of the Industry Assistance Commission (IAC), and its predecessor, the Tariff Board. The role of Alf Rattigan, Chairman of the Tariff Board and later the IAC, is stressed. Liberalisation since 1988 has been drastic, so that most tariffs will be brought down to 5 per cent by the year 2000. All quotas were ended by 1993. This can be contrasted with very high protection levels in 1967 and quite high levels even in 1987. Substantial unilateral trade liberalisation normally requires exchange rate depreciation, and the floating of the Australian dollar made the tariff reductions possible. The motives for Australian trade liberalisation in the 1980s are compared with those for similar liberalisations in many developing countries.     

全球金融危机与国际贸易保护:兼与1929-1933年大萧条的比较

全球金融危机爆发后,贸易保护主义悄然在世界范围内蔓延,自由的国际贸易体系受到了强烈的冲击。这种贸易保护主义是否会重蹈1929-1933年大萧条时期世界性贸易战的覆辙?通过对此次金融危机和1929-1933年大萧条时期的国际贸易保护进行比较研究,作者认为由于在危机爆发后可供选择的宏观经济政策工具、国际贸易的约束规则、国际生产体系、国际协调机制和应对金融危机的经验等方面与大萧条时期存在着不同,虽然此次金融危机爆发后有国际贸易保护的趋势,但由此引发1929-1933年大萧条那样的世界性贸易战的可能性较小。然而,国际经济界仍要防微杜渐,采取有利措施来应对贸易保护主义。     

Disguised Protectionism, Global Trade Rules and Alien Invasive Species

Current international law strongly favors policies designed to make imports safer (e.g., in terms of invasive species) over policies explicitly designed to discourage imports. We show that this preference may be counterproductive. A externality in trade is incorporated into a political-economy model of policy formation. Nations can address the externality by inspecting cargo and imposing a fine on contaminated imports. We compare the equilibrium when inspection is the only policy option relative to the equilibrium that emerging when nations may also manipulate the tariff. Ruling out the tariff causes socially excessive stringency in general, social welfare losses if domestic supply is highly inelastic, and in some circumstances an increase in the real tariff, measured as the difference between world and domestic prices.     

国际贸易壁垒变动对企业行为影响的内在机理与演进趋势

经济全球化和贸易自由化使得关税壁垒和传统的非关税壁垒作为贸易保护手段的作用逐渐减弱,取而代之的是以技术壁垒、绿色壁垒、社会壁垒等为主的新型贸易壁垒。在贸易壁垒变动后所形成的新的贸易制度环境下,企业惟有适应壁垒的变化,寻求内部资源能力与外部环境的动态平衡,才有可能获得生存、发展并壮大。     

Endogenous trade policy: Political struggle in the growth process

This paper develops a dynamic theory that accounts for the evolution of trade policy, underlying internal class conflicts, and output growth performance. Analysis of political responses to the distributional effects of international trade reveals that economies with a comparative advantage in manufacturing may reach a developed stage through the ebb and flow of protectionism. This nonmonotonic evolution of trade policy is consistent with the historical experience of Western Europe over the last few centuries.     

新形势下中国如何应对美国贸易保护主义

20世纪80年代以来,美国对外贸易保护主义开始抬头,金融危机以来,美国经济颓势不可避免,这使得贸易保护主义不断升温,随着中国经济的强大,美国对华的贸易保护主义尤为突出。文中介绍了美国对华实行的贸易保护主义手段：＂购买美国货＂和＂雇用美国人＂双项条款、对华采取＂反倾销＂和＂反补贴＂双反并用、对华不断使用＂特殊保障措施＂、美国迫使人民币升值等;又分析了美对华实行贸易保护主义政策的主要原因：经济危机的影响、国内一些利益集团的诉求、中国经济的持续高速发展。在此分析的基础上,又进一步提出了中国应对美国贸易保护主义措施：充分利用WTO有关规则,维护我国的正当权益;积极运用WTO争端解决机制来化解中美贸易摩擦;把扩大内需作为长期的发展战略;推动公平、开放的自由贸易环境;以自主创新增强国际竞争力等。     

TAX-PRICE REFORM WITH DIRECTLY UNPRODUCTIVE PROFIT-SEEKING (DUP) ACTIVITIES*

This paper explores the extent to which insights available from existing writings on directly unproductive profit-seeking (DUP) activities in international trade modify rules of tax and tariff reform in normative public economics and examines in what way these should affect advice on tax policy usually given to developing countries. The analysis proceeds by developing two models. The first incorporates revenue seeking directly into a standard open economy public finance model and examines whether analysis of policy reform and economic costs of distortionary tariffs must be modified. The second includes a political component in the form of lobbying for subsidies – the expenditure side of the budget – as well as a normative economic component that raises taxes – the revenue side – to finance the social costs of such lobbying. The model can be used to determine the effects of politically determined expenditures on tax setting. The analysis shows that the grammar of welfare-theoretic arguments that underlies the reform and design of tax and tariff structures is robust to the inclusion of DUP activities of the type considered here. In particular, the latter lend no presumption in favor of uniformity in tax and tariff structures. It is argued that existing policy advice on tax and tariff reform derived from models where DUP activities have traditionally played no role continues to be appropriate when account is taken of formal treatments of DUP-type phenomena extant in the current literature.     

Economies of scale and trade policy: The median voter model revisited

Why do some political economy models perform so poorly in predicting actual trade policy? Do scale economies provide the missing puzzle to our understanding of the anti-trade bias? By integrating economies of scale in production, this paper theoretically reinstates the median voter model as in Mayer [Mayer, W. (1984). Endogenous tariff formation. The American Economic Review, 74, 970–985] as a suitable political economy model in predicting trade policy. The modified model generates the scope for the anti-trade bias and predicts that sometimes economic, rather than political, considerations may lead to restrictive trade.     

Protection for maturing industries: Evidence from Canadian trade patterns and trade policy, 1870–1913

As industries mature, experience is accumulated, productivity increases, trade performance improves on domestic and international markets and learning potential dissipates. Using theory‐consistent empirical specifications, I find a strong, robust negative relationship linking tariff rates to trade performance for manufactured products that matured during the first decade after Canada prioritized protectionist policy objectives in 1879. This relationship also holds at a more aggregate industry level, where I can use other measures of maturity, control for import penetration, use historically contemporaneous trade elasticity estimates, link trade performance to trade restrictiveness and effective rates of protection and where I can instrument for import penetration and trade performance using a two‐stage IV–GMM estimation approach. The results suggest that after 1890 the Canadian government carefully cut tariffs on products produced by maturing Canadian producers and this retreat from protectionism significantly lowered the static deadweight losses resulting from Canadian trade policy during the post‐1890 period.     

Trade Liberalization in the Presence of Foreign Direct Investment and Tax Credits: Estimates for Costa Rica

The paper uses a calibrated general-equilibrium model to quantify the welfare impact of trade liberalization—and compute the optimal tariff structure—for Costa Rica when trade-policy-induced foreign direct investment and international capital taxation with credits are present. It shows that complete trade liberalization reduces Costa Rica's welfare, as it leads to an outflow of capital and loss of tax revenue which more than offset the efficiency gains from an enhanced resource allocation. The optimal tariff structure for the Costa Rican economy turns out to be a mixture of relatively small import tariffs and subsidies.