Preferences,Country Bias,and International Trade

The paper analyzes international trade in a Ricardian world where consumer preferences exhibit country bias. In particular, consumers differentiate between identical physical goods by country of manufacture. In contrast to the classical Ricardian model, the pattern of international specialization in production depends on the preference structure. Possible equilibrium configurations include ones where both countries specialize incompletely and trade in both commodities, as well as situations where the pattern of specialization and trade is the reverse of that in the classical Ricardian world. Both interindustry and intraindustry trade can occur simultaneously, though there are no market imperfections or scale economies.     

Nonhomothetic Preferences and International Trade

This study examines whether nonhomothetic preferences underlie the “missing trade” problem associated with factor content of trade models. We first find that per capita income goes a long way in explaining differences in goods consumption across countries. We then find a striking correlation between the factor content of consumption and per capita income, and show that accounting for this is a key part of resolving the case of the missing trade. However, nonhomothetic preferences over broad categories of expenditure play only a small role in this phenomenon. Rather, we find that as income grows, spending is directed towards the relatively capital‐intensive version of a given good. Since recent research shows that capital intensity is correlated with quality ( Schott, 2004 ), our results suggest that within‐product quality differences are likely important for explaining the factor content of trade, whereas nonhomothetic preferences over broad categories of expenditure are much less so.     

Manufacturing and the Trade Balance

When the world shifted to the regime of flexible exchange rates after 1970, economists expected that large trade imbalances would soon disappear. Instead, such imbalances not only persisted but soared in the 1980s and 1990s, in spite of significant changes in important currencies such as the yen, the mark and the dollar. This paper reports that manufacturing importers tend to suffer trade deficits whereas exporters of manufacturing products tend to enjoy trade surpluses. The reason lies in the higher rates of productivity growth experienced by exporters of manufactures.     

Equilibrium, Trade, and Capital Accumulation

The paper summarizes the author's principal contributions to economic theory: (1) one of the first rigorous proofs of the existence of competitive equilibrium; (2) existence of competitive equilibrium with weakened assumptions; (3) the minimum income approach to demand theory; (4) tatonnement stability with weak gross substitutes; (5) a general theory of comparative advantage; (6) factor price equalization with attention to factor supplies; and (7) turnpike theory allowing for von Neumann facets and neighbourhood convergence.
JEL Classification Number: B10     

Dynamic Patterns of Trade Imbalances with Recursive Preference

Based on the recursive preference approach, the dynamic and global properties of the two‐country open economy are examined with one good and inputs of labor and capital, with capital being freely traded internationally. First, by showing that the world's consumption increases (decreases) with an increase (decrease) in the world's capital, the global stability of the economy is obtained. Secondly, the nonmonotonicity of consumption between impatient country 1 and patient country 2 is established. Thirdly, with the Cobb–Douglas‐type production function and country 1's technological superiority, the dynamic trade patterns and the asset–debt position are derived.     

Task Routineness and Trade Policy Preferences

Understanding the formation of individual trade policy preferences is a fundamental input into the modeling of trade policy outcomes. Surprisingly, past studies have found mixed evidence that various labor market and industry attributes of workers affect their trade policy preferences, even though recent studies have found that trade policy can have substantial impacts on workers' incomes. This paper provides the first analysis of the extent to which task routineness affects trade policy preferences using survey data from the American National Election Studies. We find significant evidence that greater task routineness leads workers to be much more supportive of import restrictions, consistent with recent evidence on how trade openness puts downward pressure on employment and wages for workers whose occupations involve routine tasks. In fact, other than education levels, task routineness is the only labor market attribute that displays a robust correlation with individuals' stated trade policy preferences. We also provide evidence that there are some interactions between the economic and non‐economic factors in our study. For example, women's trade policy views are much more invariant to their labor market attributes than men, suggesting that women's views on this issue are driven more by personal and ideological beliefs than men.     

Preferences for Educational Status,Human Capital Accumulation,and Growth

Using an overlapping generations model in which human capital accumulation has positive external effects on the production of the human capital of future generations, this paper analyzes implications of agents’ having preferences for educational status, represented by human capital holdings relative to the social average. Examining the value and sign of the optimal distortionary tax in the optimal taxation scheme, we analyze the efficiency of the level of human capital accumulation in a decentralized economy. The desire for educational status can compensate for insufficient accumulation of human capital stemming from human capital externalities directed toward future generations.     

Eco-Dumping, Capital Mobility, and International Trade

A small open economy’s optimal environmental policy is studied in a model with international capital mobility and local pollution. The country produces traded as well as non-traded goods. Is it in the country’s interest to engage in ecological dumping by choosing generous pollution allowances for the traded-good sector? The answer depends decisively on the policy regime in use. Dumping is not optimal if the country ensures that the implicit rent on pollution is completely appropriated within the country. However, if the implicit factor reward on pollution leaves the country because it accrues to (foreign) owners of mobile capital, the local welfare maximizing government tends to discriminate against the traded-good sector, the opposite of ecological dumping.     

Labor Mobility, Trade, and Social Capital

Labor market integration raises welfare in the absence of distortions. This paper examines labor and goods market integration in a general‐equilibrium model with social capital. The findings are: (i) labor market integration has an ambiguous impact on welfare, and raises it if the goods and labor skills are sufficiently different; (ii) compared to Pareto optimum, labor mobility (social capital) is excessively large (depleted); (iii) trade is superior to labor market integration if trading costs are no higher than private migration costs, otherwise the outcome is ambiguous; and (iv) the creation of new institutions in response to labor market integration has an ambiguous impact on welfare.     

The Intersectoral Terms of Trade and Their Impact on Urbanisation in China

The historical experience of developed countries shows that the economic development process and accompanying urbanisation represent a structural transformation from an economy dominated by agriculture to one dominated by non-agricultural activities. Therefore it is generally believed that the agricultural sector needs to make a net transfer of resources, both capital and labour, to other sectors in the processes of economic transformation and urbanisation. However, the process of urbanisation in a socialist economy can be negatively affected by its pattern of resource generation. On the basis of an analysis of the 'scissors' pricing mechanism to which the state had recourse for financing its industrialisation, this article argues that this kind of resource transfer did not necessarily favour a high rate of urban employment and urbanisation, regardless of the magnitude of the seizure of resources from the agricultural sector.     

贸易顺差、资本流入与中国外汇储备规模增长

本文通过协整检验和Granger因果关系检验,对影响我国外汇储备规模快速增长的诸因素进行了实证分析。分析结果表明,（1）我国外汇储备规模与年出口额、外国证券投资、外商直接投资、外债还本付息额具有长期的稳定关系。（2）年出口规模与外汇储备规模之间具有单向因果关系,是造成外汇储备快速增长的主要原因。（3）外商直接投资、外国证券投资和外汇储备规模具有正向相关关系,其影响强度较弱;而外债还本付息额与外汇储备呈负向相关关系。（4）1986年～2009年间,贸易顺差对外汇储备规模增长的贡献度约为68%,而资本流入约为32%。本文基于实证分析结果认为,采取贸易项目收支平衡战略以减少外汇储备过度增长是最佳的选择。     

论人力资本与智力资本的"虚拟资本"性质

本文认为人力资本、智力资本理论的产生,本质上是提出了"虚拟资本"问题,是对这些过去被看作是费用或成本的东西进行"资本化定价".在当代企业的资本范畴中实际上已经形成了以实体资本为一方的"硬资本"和以虚拟资本为另一方的"软资本"两大部份,而这两大部份是建立在"资本三要素"--物质资本、人力资本、智力资本基础上的.由"资本三要素"的基础概念,我们可以推解出一系列新的资本概念和形态,从中我们可以较清晰地辨别虚拟资本与实体资本的构架与层次,并可直观地厘清它们的边界与关系,这有利于我们更好地理解人力资本与智力资本的特性和功能.     

China's Exchange Rate Policy and Its Trade Balance with the US

This paper investigates the claim that China's exchange rate policy causes the US trade deficit with China to grow. Although there is no evidence that changes in the exchange rate cause the trade deficit to rise in the short run, a statistically significant long‐run relationship between the RMB/dollar exchange rate and the US trade deficit with China is detected. As the value of the dollar declines (or RMB appreciates), ceteris paribus, so does the trade deficit. Hence, there is a need for China to adjust its exchange rate policy to help reduce the ever mounting US trade deficit.     

International Trade and Volume Patterns under Quasilinear Preferences

We formally analyze the pattern and volume of trade by embedding quasilinear preferences in the standard perfectly competitive, two‐factor, two‐good, two‐country trade model. Quasilinear preferences deliver a natural partition of the two goods into a luxury and a necessity, and preserve the validity of the Heckscher–Ohlin and Heckscher–Ohlin–Vanek theorems. In addition, the predicted factor content of trade under quasilinear preferences is smaller (larger) than the predicted factor content of trade under homothetic preferences if and only if the luxury good is capital (labor) intensive. This result offers a novel explanation for the “missing‐trade” mystery.     

Monetary Non-Neutrality and the Intertemporal Approach to the Balance of Trade: The UK Trade Balance under Bretton Woods

Previous research on the intertemporal approach is based on the standard, real model of the balance of trade. This paper outlines a more general model that allows for monetary non-neutrality, and tests the general model against a restricted version that embodies neutrality. While the empirical analysis focuses on the UK trade balance during the Bretton Woods era, the fundamental issues are of interest to more than just students of Bretton Woods.     

Productive Capacity, Product Varieties, and the Elasticities Approach to the Trade Balance

Most macroeconomic models imply that faster income growth tends either to lower a country’s trade balance by raising its imports with little change to its exports or to reduce its terms of trade in order to maintain balanced trade. Krugman (1989 ) proposed a model in which countries grow by producing new varieties of goods. In his model, faster‐growing countries are able to export these new goods and maintain balanced trade without suffering any deterioration in their terms of trade. This paper analyzes the growth of US imports from different source countries and finds strong support for Krugman’s model.     

我国创业资本运动障碍研究

本文通过理论和实证分析,找出我国创业资本运动障碍所在:创业投资制度缺陷及政府扶持不到位,创业投资主体缺位和游离及其投资行为变异,创业投资决策规则扭曲.并得出结论:我国创业资本运动的障碍并不在于政府干预过多,而是政府干预的错位行为以及缺位行为.     

Monetary Expansion,International Trade and Capital Accumulation*

This paper considers the long-run domestic and foreign effects of a domestic monetary expansion in a two-country model in which the processes of capital accumulation at home and abroad interact with each other via international trade. We investigate the global stability conditions and their relationship with the comparative dynamic effects of a monetary expansion in the model. In particular, we show that under plausible global stability conditions the early analytical results obtained by Roberts (1978) and Shieh (1984) may be reversed in the two-country model.