外部关税约束、自由贸易区规模与世界自由贸易

该文在外部关税约束条件下分析了几种不同类型的自由贸易区与世界自由贸易的关系,该文结果显示,一个实行开放成员国地位的自由贸易区可以实现世界自由贸易,但是当自由贸易区以追求成员国福利最大化为目标时,在世界规模大于4时,该自由贸易区的扩张不可能最终实现世界自由贸易.该文还研究了对称的自由贸易区是否可以通过进一步的融合从而把世界变成一个一体化的自由贸易区,结果显示,具有对称市场能力的自由贸易区可以通过进一步的融合提高成员国福利,从而最终实现世界自由贸易.     

区域经济一体化对多边自由贸易体制的影响——一个简单的制度经济学解释

区域经济一体化组织的出现是否有利于推动多边自由贸易的实现,这一问题已经引起了学者们的广泛关注.从制度经济学的角度看,先走区域经济一体化的道路,然后再进行区域经济组织的自由贸易合作,从而最终实现全球贸易的自由化,能够比"一味地"等待世界所有国家同时实现贸易的自由化给各利益主体带来更大的现期净收益.因此,相比WTO所推行的多边贸易自由化而言,区域经济一体化具有更多的现实性和可行性,它将为世界自由贸易的实现做阶段性准备.当然在此过程中,还应该注意加强WTO对区域经济一体化组织的监督和协调,以引导它向更有利于提高世界福利和贸易自由化的方向发展.     

Networks of Free Trade Agreements among Heterogeneous Countries

The paper examines the formation of free trade agreements as a network formation game. We consider an n‐country model in which international trade occurs between economies with imperfectly competitive product markets. In each country, the labor market is either unionized or non‐unionized. We show that, if all countries are non‐unionized, the global free trade network is both the unique pairwise stable network and the unique efficient network. If all countries are unionized, the global free trade network is pairwise stable and the unique efficient network among the class of symmetric networks. If some countries are unionized while others are non‐unionized, other networks apart from the global free trade network may be pairwise stable. However, the efficient network is still the global free trade network. Thus, a conflict between stability and efficiency may occur. Moreover, starting from the network in which no country has signed a free trade agreement, all sequences of networks due to continuously profitable deviations do not lead (in most cases) to the global free trade network, even when global free trade is stable.     

International timber markets and tropical deforestation: the evidence from prices

Some scholars suggest that global timber markets, especially those involving high value species, are a leading cause of tropical deforestation. Despite limited empirical evidence, this hypothesis rests on the assumption that global timber markets respond to a common equilibrating mechanism that provides strong enough incentives for loggers in the tropical regions of the world. This article develops a simple model and taps into a unique data set on timber prices of hardwood and softwood in leading markets to test the global timber markets hypothesis. While we find evidence of a global equilibrating mechanism with potentially significant economic incentives to affect tropical deforestation, our results do not endorse the common conjecture in the literature that timber price shocks in developed countries lead to a homogeneous response in terms of deforestation everywhere in the tropical world. Instead, they invite further development of structural global timber market models to assess the linkages between markets and the consequences of such linkages to deforestation.     

Exchanging market access at the outsiders' expense: the case of customs unions

Abstract.  Under a customs union, countries can exchange preferential market access by coordinating external tariffs to shift profits from excluded countries. I show that the exporting rents resulting from this coordination can offset trade diversion losses produced by the union, even if its members are relatively small in world markets. Such gains come, however, at the expense of excluded countries. I show that small countries can use customs unions also to foster multilateral cooperation, by increasing the incentives of excluded countries to support global free trade.     

THE EFFECTS OF THE 1996 U.S.‐CANADA SOFTWOOD LUMBER AGREEMENT ON THE INDUSTRIAL USERS OF LUMBER: AN EVENT STUDY

In this article, we analyze whether the Softwood Lumber Agreement between the United States and Canada imposed significant economic costs on industries that use softwood lumber in the United States. To ascertain this impact, we use an event study. Our event study analyzes variations in the stock prices of lumber‐using firms listed at the major stock markets in the United States. We find that the news of events leading to the Softwood Lumber Agreement had significant negative impacts on the stock prices of industries using softwood lumber. The average reduction of stock prices for our sample of firms was approximately 5.42% over all the events considered. (JEL F13, F23)     

Free trade: what are the terms-of-trade effects?

Changes in trade policy affect a nation’s economic welfare through terms-of-trade and volume-of-trade effects. A move to global free trade would imply higher world economic welfare equal to the sum of all nations’ volume-of-trade, or efficiency, effects. Since the sum of the terms-of-trade effects across all nations is zero, terms-of-trade effects are contentious. Konishi, Kowalczyk and Sjöström (2003) have shown that if customs unions do not affect trade with non-member countries, immediate global free could be achieved if free trade were proposed together with international sidepayments equal to the terms of trade effects. How large would these terms of trade effects, and hence transfers, be? This paper presents estimates from a simple computable general equilibrium model of a world economy of perfect competition. We show that, in some cases, terms-of-trade effects are small compared to efficiency gains, and transfers are not necessary for free trade. In other cases, terms-of-trade gains may account for more than 50% of a country’s gains from free trade and transfers could be large.     

IS TRADE IN TECHNOLOGY SUPERIOR TO TRADE IN GOODS?

Using a Ricardian setting we argue that trade in technology generates higher global welfare relative to trade in goods. Hence, free trade in commodities can only be the second best outcome for the world welfare.     

Distance measures between free trade and autarky for the world economy

We develop a methodology to determine numerically how globalized the world economy is. We present a global general equilibrium model capturing major OECD economies and a residual rest of world for which alternative metrics of distance between observed, free trade and autarky equilibria can be developed. We use data for 2000 and report a number of distance measures between the 2000 observed trade restricted equilibrium and both free trade and autarky equilibria noting the absence of prior literature on metrics of distance between equilibria. The measures are used to determine the degree to which the world economy is globalized.     

Effects of trade diversion and trade creation of MERCOSUR on US and world apple markets

Apples are the third most valuable fruit in the United States and account for 18% of US fruit exports. Chile is a major competitor to the United States in the MERCOSUR market, since it is one of the leading apple producing countries and enjoys the tariff reductions as a member of MERCOSUR. Consequently, Chilean exports displace US exports in MERCOSUR. In addition, other MERCOSUR members import more from lower-cost Chile, leading to a reduction in production and an increase in consumption in these countries. This study develops a theoretical and an empirical model of world apple market to quantify the trade diversion and trade creation effects of the MERCOSUR free trade agreement and to estimate the welfare impacts.     

Estimating the Impact of WTO and Domestic Reforms on the Indian Cotton and Textile Sectors: a General-Equilibrium Approach

The agreement to abolish the quotas on textiles and clothing introduced under the Multi‐fiber Arrangement (MFA) will create a new and much more competitive world market for India's exports of textiles and clothing. India's inefficient and costly policies, such as cotton export quotas, the hank yarn obligation, and the restrictive policies on foreign investment that have held back productivity in the Indian apparel sector, will impose serious costs. The authors consider the implications of reforming these policies in an open trading environment using a multiregion, applied general‐equilibrium model. They find that the costs of these policies to India increase substantially following abolition of the MFA; the benefits to India from domestic reforms are considerably enhanced when there is global free trade in textiles and apparel.     

发展低碳经济对于可持续发展及相关产业发展的促进价值

由于全球升温给人类的生产和生活等各个方面带来的灾难日益严重,温室效应问题引起了各国的广泛关注。作为温室气体排放权的起点《京都议定书》确定了帮助发达国家缔约方减轻其承担减排义务费用的三个灵活机制:排放贸易机制,联合履行机制和清洁发展机制。在介绍了由于全球的环境问题存在着区域差异和控制气候变化的国际合作中,因为国家利益和立场的差异,使得180多个国家分化成不同的国家利益集团,从而形成了国际碳交易市场的现状。分析了中国从世界各国碳交易市场的现状中得到的启示以及中国目前碳交易现状。阐述了国际碳交易对中国主要产业发展的启示,分别介绍了中国各产业经济等方面应该把握的机遇和迎接的挑战。     

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。     

Free Trade versus Autarky under Asymmetric Cournot Oligopoly

The paper compares free trade with autarky in an asymmetric multi‐country world under Cournot competition with constant returns to scale and linear demand. We derive respective conditions under which free trade will hurt a country's consumers, benefit its firms, induce it to export, increase its output and raise its welfare. We show that these conditions are linked in a clear order, with one implying the next. We further demonstrate that free trade can reduce world total output and total consumer surplus as well as world welfare. Along the way, we correct several oversights in the literature.     

International treaties on trade and global pollution

The paper shows that global pollution need not rise under free trade in goods and/or emissions even in the complete absence of income effects. Differences in environmental concerns across the countries lead to differences in the pollution intensity of production and, thus, generate the possibility of increasing world output and income without increasing the world pollution by shifting the production of the polluting good from the country with higher pollution intensity of production to the country with lower one. We show that free trade in goods and/or emissions can induce precisely such a shifting of production with the country with greater environmental concern exporting the polluting good. The paper also demonstrates the possibility of a first-best international treaty on global pollution in which each country or group of countries is better-off.     

FREE TRADE NETWORKS WITH TRANSFERS*

We investigate the network of bilateral free trade agreements (FTAs) in the context of a network formation game with transfers. In a previous paper we showed that without international transfers countries with different industrialization levels cannot sign an FTA, so that the global free trade network, in which every pair of countries signs an FTA, is not in general pairwise‐stable. In this paper we show that, even if the world consists of fairly asymmetric countries, the global free trade network is pairwise‐stable when transfers between FTA signatories are allowed. Moreover, it is a unique pairwise‐stable network unless industrial commodities are highly substitutable.     

Productivity and territorial specialization

On the basis of a relatively free trade world and global economy, specialization tends to increase the comparative advantages of a country. But in this scenario, not countries but cities are the territorial organizations that play the main role. Cities concentrate the economic activity and political influential household that reflects economic changes.The purpose of this study is to explore the principles underlie the distribution of population on a territory and the likely effect of economic development on redistributing population geographically.     

How strong is the global integration of emerging market regions? An empirical assessment

This paper attempts to evaluate the time-varying integration of emerging markets from a regional perspective based on a conditional version of the International Capital Asset Pricing Model (ICAPM) with DCC-GARCH parameters that allows for dynamic changes in the degree of market integration, global market risk premium, regional exchange-rate risk premium, and local market risk premium. Our findings reveal several interesting facts. First, the time-varying degree of integration of four emerging regions under consideration, satisfactorily explained by the regional level of trade openness and the term premium of US interest rates, has recently tended to increase, but these markets still remain substantially segmented from the world market. Second, the local market risk premium is found to explain more than 50% of the total risk premium for emerging market returns. Finally, we show that conditional correlations usually underestimate and overstate the measure of time-varying market integration. The empirical results of this study have some important implications for both global investors and policymakers with respect to dedicated portfolio investments in emerging markets and policy adjustments.     

Conjoint analysis of industry location preferences: evidence from the softwood lumber industry in the US

Conjoint Analysis (CA) was used to study location preferences among members of the softwood lumber industry in the southern and western regions of the US. This industry was selected as an example of a resource-based industry to test several hypotheses derived from location theory. Decision-makers, owners and managers, identified price of logs and distance to sources for logs as the most important location factors. A secondary category included wages and energy costs. Other variables such as cost of land, quality of access roads and distance to markets are less important. There were statistically significant differences in the part-worth estimates of raw materials and wage costs among decision-makers but not between regions in an ordered model for site preference. Marginal analysis of the price of logs stressed its importance as the major location factor in the softwood lumber industry.     

AGRICULTURAL AND NAMA REFORM UNDER DOHA: IMPLICATIONS FOR ASIA-PACIFIC ECONOMIES

Abstract.  This paper provides estimates of the potential gains to the Asia Pacific region from completely freeing merchandise trade globally and from partial liberalizations that might emerge from the Doha Round. Particular attention is given to agriculture, where the majority of the gains would arise. The results suggest that moving to free global merchandise trade would boost real incomes in the Western Pacific proportionately more than in other regions. The Doha partial liberalization scenarios considered would move the world only a small way towards complete free trade, but inreasingly so the more developing countries themselves are willing to open up.