Liberalising the Movement of Natural Persons: A Lost Decade?

Liberalisation of international trade in services through the Movement of Natural Persons (Mode 4) remains one of the least negotiated issues of trade policy among the 144 members of the World Trade Organisation. Economists believe that there is a basic convergence of economic interest between the developed and the developing world for liberalising Mode 4. Yet the multilateral trading system has not facilitated greater worker mobility between the labour‐surplus and labour‐scarce countries. Is there any economic logic as to why cross‐border movements of workers have not followed the pattern predicted by international trade theory? Or are there strong socio‐political barriers that have come in the way of liberalising Mode 4? These are some of the questions the paper attempts to answer. The paper shows that the economic arguments against the free movement of natural persons are based on the narrow perspective of the welfare of domestic workers while ignoring the benefit it brings to the economy as a whole. Further, non‐economic arguments miss the point that the movement of workers under Mode 4 of GATS is temporary in nature, and so unlikely to have any lasting social and cultural spillovers. The paper gives specific illustrations from the recent past where temporary import of workers from labour‐surplus countries has enabled both developed and developing countries sustain their economic growth. It concludes by arguing that the environment for renegotiating WTO commitments under this important sector of international trade in services is better than ever before, even though the current world economic slowdown may delay actual negotiations for a while.     

Trade in Educational Services: Trends and Emerging Issues

This paper examines the trends and emerging issues in trade in educational services. It provides rough estimates of the size of the international market in educational services drawing on the limited data available in services trade statistics and data on foreign students in tertiary education in OECD countries. It outlines the current commitments for trade in educational services under the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). It also reviews the implications of the on‐going GATS negotiations for further multilateral trade liberalisation in this sector. It points out that OECD countries have been noticeably reluctant to make proposals for further liberalisation of trade in educational services. One reason for this is the concern in many countries about the potential threats posed to cultural values and national traditions by growing trade liberalisation in educational services. Finally, the paper reviews some of the main policy issues arising from trade in educational services.     

The Determinants of GATS Commitment Coverage

This paper investigates hypotheses about the determinants of trade and investment liberalisation with a particular focus on the market access and national treatment commitments under the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). We set up a database of these GATS commitments and use the ratio of all commitments listed by a country to the possible number of commitments as a measure of liberalisation of market access/national treatment. Our empirical analysis suggests that larger and ‘richer’ countries commit to more liberal regimes of market access and national treatment. This is surprising since economic theory predicts the largest welfare gains for low‐skilled abundant (skilled‐labour/physical‐capital‐scarce) economies. Also, our findings suggest that liberalisation is stronger among geographically close countries with strong ties in goods trade.     

Economic Implications of WTO Negotiations on Non‐agricultural Market Access

The economic implications of current WTO negotiations are likely to be far reaching. The World Bank and UNCTAD estimate annual global gains in agriculture and non‐agricultural products (including fish) of about $70−150 billion each under various scenarios and technical assumptions. Liberalising trade in services could be even more important, especially if agreement were reached to facilitate the temporary movement of labour (Mode 4 under the General Agreement on Trade in Services, GATS). Some qualifications, however, are in order. First, gains are likely to be spread unevenly across countries and across sectors; and, second, short‐term adjustment costs might precede long‐term gains. Much depends on how ambitious liberalisation is and on policies to facilitate adjustment. This paper examines the Doha mandate in non‐agricultural market access (NAMA) and the current state of the WTO negotiations, in particular some key proposals being considered at the December 2005 Ministerial Meeting in Hong Kong. We analyse various scenarios and their implications for trade, welfare, output, employment, revenues and preferences, as well as the distributional effects across countries and sectors. We note possible adjustment problems related to balance of payments and structural adjustment, as well as revenue and preference losses. These suggest the need for ‘aid for trade’ to help developing countries realise gains possible from WTO negotiations.     

GATS框架下自然人流动规则的问题和出路

本文通过对自然人流动规则面临的困境分析,以期探寻推动自然人流动自由化进一步深化的出路。自然人流动制度存在的结构性缺陷及贸易壁垒泛滥的根本原因是成员方基于国家利益的政策选择差异。由于GATS框架缺乏主动性完善机制促使成员方放弃自然人流动的贸易保护主义倾向并打消开放国内市场顾虑,因而谈判面临无法克服的困难。自然人流动在区域贸易协定、国际组织及国家间层面上具有更广阔的自由化空间,可以作为自然人流动自由化一个更现实的可行国际法路径。     

Trade in healthcare and health insurance services: WTO/GATS as a supporting actor (?)

The General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) is far broader in policy coverage than conventional trade agreements for goods. At the same time, governments are offered more flexibility to tailor their obligations to sector- or country-specific needs. As a result, commitments vary widely across sectors and modes of supply. Health insurance has proved far more popular, for instance, than healthcare services. Surprisingly, governments have been less selective in other policy contexts, in particular bilateral investment treaties (BITs). Many signatories of such treaties, including individual EU Members, have undertaken potentially challenging obligations across virtually all service sectors. Yet, though frequently invoked, BITs do not meet the same standards, in terms of transparency, open (consensual) rulemaking and legal certainty, as commitments under the GATS.     

International Trade Agreements and International Migration

Despite large potential economic gains, bilateral and multilateral negotiations focusing on liberalisation of migration have not shared the high profile of international trade negotiations and agreements. Migration and trade have been traditionally viewed rather separately and the relevance of the many, and complex, interdependencies has been given remarkably little attention in the literature to date. In this article, we focus on the two‐way interaction between international migration and agreements designed to enhance cross‐border trade and investment. Liberalisation of international trade in services and in the movement of people potentially offers much greater economic gains than liberalisation of remaining barriers to goods trade. However, progress within multilateral frameworks is fraught with difficulty. The World Trade Organization’s General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) has yielded little real progress so far and negotiations within more flexible unilateral and bilateral frameworks are likely to be more successful in liberalising the movement of labour. We discuss a range of specific examples, focusing particularly on the interesting case of New Zealand. We find that trade agreements are increasingly including agreements on migration, though typically favouring temporary migration and involving numerically modest quotas. We conclude that migration regulatory frameworks are likely to be further and more strongly linked to trade and investment agreements in the future, particularly given changing economic and demographic forces. The primary focus of migration policies may nonetheless remain different from that of trade policies. While further migration liberalisation is likely to be through bilateral and regional agreements, it will be important to try to lock in the gains of such agreements, while simultaneously working to consolidating these in a way that will help to facilitate future multilateral agreement.     

The value of market access and national treatment commitments in services trade agreements

This paper looks at market access and national treatment commitments for services in the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) and in 95 regional trade agreements (RTAs) involving the countries that are covered in the OECD Services Trade Restrictiveness Index (STRI). The objective is to quantify the impact of legal bindings on trade in services that result from a reduction in the uncertainty faced by exporters. Bilateral bindings indices are created for five broad service sectors (professional services, computer services, telecoms, financial services and transport services). They indicate how close the sector is from a fully bound regime with no possibility to introduce any new trade barrier, by comparing commitments with the actual trade regime. These bilateral indices are then tested over the period 2000–2014 in a structural gravity model. Despite differences across sectors, the results confirm that the legal bindings typically found in services trade agreements tend to have a positive impact on exports even if no actual liberalisation takes place.     

过境交付服务贸易的发展及其自由化问题初探

过境交付是四种服务贸易模式中与其他模式最显著不同的一种。这种最类似于货物贸易的国际服务贸易的成长,打破了服务总是需要人或物为载体,服务本身不能被存储和独立运输的传统观念,提高了服务的可贸易性,对推动全球服务贸易的发展具有极为重要的意义。全球电子商务和服务外包的蓬勃发展,原本不占服务贸易重要地位的过境交付贸易迎来了发展新机遇。在电子商务被引入多哈回合的谈判后,与电子商务密切相关的过境交付自由化问题也引起全球关注。     

论将东道国公司的外籍雇员提供服务纳入GATS

东道国公司的外籍雇员提供服务是否属于GATS框架下的自然人流动尚属一个不确定的问题.将这种服务提供模式纳入GATS很有必要,这对于增进发展中国家和世界整体福利都是有益的.从长远来看,直接将其纳入GATS协定文本或附录最彻底;从目前来看,最可行的方案是将各国的外籍工人引进计划纳入各成员方的具体承诺表.     

《服务贸易总协定》下自然人流动的福利效应分析

自然人流动是《服务贸易总协定》框架下贸易量最小的一种模式,但是由于涉及到人员的跨境流动,关系到各国的就业、社会稳定、文化等各方面的问题,各国政府在作出承诺的时候还是比较谨慎的。文章以单个产品模型中的要素流动分析为基础,分析了自然人暂时流动的福利效应,希望能为各国政府的政策制定和下一轮的多边谈判提供理论上的依据和支持。     

Trade in Services: The Elasticity Approach for The Case of Turkey

This study includes the analysis of global trade in the services and service sector in Turkey, and estimates the elasticity of trade in services to real exchange rates and income. There is an increasing role of the service sector in the Turkish economy; however, a decreasing trend of trade in services is taking place. The commitments of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) were found to be ineffective, at least in the case of Turkey. The empirical findings suggest that the real exchange rate is not a significant determinant for the trade in services. We found an inelastic real exchange rate and income elasticities in trade demand functions. However, the value of income elasticity significantly exceeds the value of real exchange rate elasticity.     

Do WTO+ commitments in services trade agreements reflect a quest for optimal regulatory convergence? Evidence from Asia

Literature examining WTO + commitments in services trade agreements (STA s) has not considered the role of services regulation. We bridge this gap using a sample of 15 South/South‐East Asian countries, given the burgeoning trend of Asian economies towards services preferentialism and the largely WTO + nature of their preferential services commitments. Our empirical findings suggest that Asian trading dyads with regulatory frameworks that are more similar and more trade restrictive tend to undertake higher levels of WTO + commitments in their STA s. There is also evidence in our results, including by modes of supply, for WTO + commitments in Asian STA s being driven by goods trade complementarities, alluding to supply chain dynamics in the region. Such results support the hypothesis that the heightened “servicification” of production generates a demand to lower services input costs arising from regulatory incidence and heterogeneity.     

论服务贸易补贴的多边规则

鉴于补贴对服务贸易可能产生的扭曲作用,建立和完善服务贸易补贴的多边纪律无疑是十分重要的。GATS有关服务贸易补贴的现行规定主要体现为第15条,另外,GATS第2条、第17条等也对其有间接规范作用。这些规定均存在缺陷与不足,因而服务贸易的多边谈判将服务贸易补贴作为了其项下的一个重要议题。但是截至目前为止,谈判仍未取得重要进展。我国则应积极关注和参与谈判,并以适当的方式设置我国的服务贸易补贴。     

电信服务贸易自由化的经济效应研究综述

GATS框架下的电信多边谈判使世界电信市场的开放进程有了明确的时间表,它通过督促各国积极实践电信承诺来推进电信服务自由化。电信服务贸易自由化不仅促进各国电信服务的相互渗透,而且有利于电信服务消费者福利的改善。电信市场开放以来取得的巨大成就显示了服务贸易自由化对经济的重要作用。     

自然人流动对中国双边贸易的影响效应——基于引力模型的实证分析

近年来,自然人流动规模不断扩大,成为各国服务贸易发展的新动向.通过扩展基本引力模型研究自然人流动对中国双边贸易的实证影响,发现存在正效应,但影响低于发达国家水平.其影响有限的原因为国内严格管制流入和专业人员流出能力有限两方面,因此,要加强我国自然人流动自由化的发展并增强对专业服务人才的培养,才能促进我国自然人流动和服务贸易的发展.     

我国教育服务贸易的新发展:“入世”十周年的回顾与反思

"入世"以后,我国的教育服务贸易得到较快发展,境外消费、中外合作办学和自然人流动是贸易的主要方式。但是,我国的教育服务贸易逆差大,对教育服务的可贸易性认识不足、教育服务国际竞争力弱、教育服务贸易立法不完善、教育管理体制僵化和国际合作有限等因素限制了我国教育服务贸易发展的深度与广度。因此,我国必须尽快制定教育服务贸易战略规划,完善教育管理体制与教育服务贸易立法,加强国际交流与合作,才能推动教育服务贸易快速健康发展。     

International Trade and Health Policy: Implications of the GATS for US Healthcare Reform

This paper examines the implications of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), the World Trade Organization’s agreement governing trade in health-related services, for health policy and healthcare reform in the United States. The paper describes the nature and scope of US obligations under the GATS, the ways in which the trade agreement intersects with domestic health policy, and the institutional factors that mediate trade-offs between health and trade policy. The analysis suggests that the GATS provisions on market access, national treatment and domestic regulation, which are designed to eliminate ‘regulatory barriers’ to global trade in health services, limit the range of options that state and federal regulators and legislative bodies can employ to regulate the health sector and implement healthcare reforms. As such, the paper identifies the broader social and ethical implications of free trade policy.     

中国服务贸易承诺自由化指标的建立和比较研究

2001年底,中国正式加入世界贸易组织,同时在有关开放服务贸易方面做出了一系列的承诺,本文计算了我国服务贸易承诺的自由化指标,并对结果进行了比较和分析。本文第一部分概述了服务贸易总协定框架下的服务贸易承诺并提出了研究的对象、方法和目的。在第二部分建立模型对服务贸易承诺自由化指标进行了计算。第三部分就服务贸易承诺自由化指标进行了分析和比较研究。     

服务贸易竞争力的初步研究

服务贸易包括跨境支付、境外消费、商业存在以及自然人流动四个模式。通过对服务贸易竞争力相关基础理论的梳理,重点从比较优势与竞争优势角度将服务贸易与传统贸易的比较优势与竞争优势进行比较,运用了巴拉萨显示性比较优势指数、贸易重叠指数、比较优势指数、国际市场占有率等指标分析。