GATT,DISPUTE SETTLEMENT AND COOPERATION*

This paper analyzes GATT and its dispute settlement procedure (DSP) in the context of a supergame model of international trade featuring both explicit and implicit agreements. An explicit agreement, such as GATT, may be violated at some positive cost in addition to retaliatory actions that might be induced by the violation. We interpret this cost as arising from “international obligation”, a phenomenon frequently mentioned in the legal literature on GATT. We focus on how international obligation affects two aspects of GATT-DSP: unilateral retaliation and the effect of inordinate delays in the operation of DSP.     

WELFARE LOSSES FROM NON‐TARIFF BARRIERS: THE JAPANESE BEEF QUOTA CASE*

A standard method of estimating deadweight losses caused by import quotas is to estimate a utility function by data over a period in which the quota is not imposed, and to use the estimated utility function to evaluate the virtual price of quota‐laden imports. This method, however, is not applicable if preferences are different between quota and non‐quota periods. In order to overcome this difficulty, the present study introduces a method of estimating a utility function directly from data in a quota period. This method is applied to the estimation of deadweight losses attributable to the Japanese beef quota.     

The Economics of Trade Disputes, the GATT's Article XXIII, and the WTO's Dispute Settlement Understanding

Economic theory has yet to provide a convincing argument that can explain why the threat of retaliation under the GATT/WTO dispute settlement procedures is not sufficient to prevent countries from violating the agreement. We consider the question of why countries violate the agreed–upon rules in the face of explicit provisions which allow them to legally adjust their trade policy. Using the GATT/WTO institutional structure and the guiding principle of reciprocity, we provide a theory suggesting when countries will choose to implement protection in violation of GATT/WTO rules, as opposed to under the relevant safeguards provisions, when trade policy adjustments are necessary between "negotiating rounds."     

ALTERNATIVE OPTIMAL TRADE POLICIES IN THE PRESENCE OF FOREIGN INPUT MONOPOLY

Abstract.  This paper develops a generalized three-country model with downstream and upstream industries to analyze optimal import and export trade policies in the presence of monopoly distortion in a foreign intermediate input market. It shows that the import tariff and export tax are linearly dependent. Thus, the optimal choice of the tariff gives rise to the same results as the optimal choice of the export tax, which implies that the domestic government, to avoid tariff retaliation, can use export tax as a substitute for the import tariff.     

Asymmetric Tax Policy Responses in Large Economies With Cross-Border Pollution

We build a model of cross-border pollution between two large open economies, one importing the polluting good and the other exporting it, and derive their non-cooperative trade and environmental tax policies. We show among other things, that (1) in response to a bilateral reduction in trade taxes by both countries, the former country’s optimal policy is to lower its Nash emissions tax while the latter’s is to raise it, and (2) in response to an increase in emissions tax rates by both countries, the former country’s optimal reaction is to raise its Nash import tariff, while the latter’s is to reduce its Nash export tax. That is, in the present context, freer trade leads the exporting country to adopt stricter while the importing country laxer environmental tax policies.     

“Measurement” or Finding Things Out in Economics: A Comment

Immiserizing growth is a long-term phenomenon that occurs when the gain in a country's social welfare arising from economic growth is more than offset by the loss in such welfare associated with an adverse shift in the terms of trade. In one case explored many years ago by Jagdish Bhagwati, immiserizing growth occurs in a developing nation that has started economic growth but faces unfavorable international demand conditions as it increases its traditional exports. In another case explored recently by Paul A. Samuelson, immiserizing growth occurs for the growing industrialized country when its trade partner follows a policy of import substituting growth and, as a result, shifts the terms of trade against the exporting country. Still others have specified a variety of different cases of immiserizing growth. The author provides a simple graphical method to analyze these situations and then presents data showing that immiserizing growth is a relatively rare phenomenon.     

Trade Restrictiveness and Deadweight Loss in China’s Imports

China is believed to have gained immensely from its admission into to the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001. One of the direct gains comes from the lessening of deadweight loss (DWL) due to tariff reduction. Conventional measures for DWL, however, are too aggregate to capture the trade policies, which are determined at a much higher disaggregated level, and ignore the interactions between tariff and corresponding import demand as suggested by theories. In this paper, we first systematically estimate the import demand elasticities at a highly disaggregated level and then match them with the most detailed lines of the applied tariff for the most favored nations as reported by the WTO. Using the detailed matching data, we construct Feenstra’s (1995) simplified trade restrictiveness index (TRI), which captures the covariance of tariff and the corresponding demand elasticity. Finally, we use the TRI to compute the DWL from1997 to 2008 and find that the DWL due to the tariff barrier was reduced to 0.73% of GNI in 2008, noticeably lower than the highest previous mark of 4.58% of GNI in 2001.     

Variable Specific Factors and the “X-Efficiency Cost” of Protection *

This paper analyzes the effects of protection on X-efficiency using a general equilibrium Ricardo-Viner model with variable sector-specific effort. As in earlier models, it is found that protection only reduces effort if the income effect is sufficiently strong. It is also shown that, provided the correct compensated import demand curve is used, all welfare effects attributable to changes in effort are captured in the standard “triangle” measure of deadweight loss. Moreover, any protection-induced fall in effort will reduce the overall cost of protection, suggesting that policy-induced “X-inefficiency” may be beneficial.     

Endogenous Timing in a Strategic Trade Policy Game: A Two-Country Oligopoly Model with Multiple Firms

This paper examines strategic trade policy games where the number of firms in the importing and exporting countries differs and all firms play as Cournot oligopolies. Under the assumption of linear demand and constant marginal cost, we show that, if the number of firms in the exporting country exceeds that in the importing country by more than three, the government of the exporting country chooses to move as a leader, imposing an export tax on firms. The government of the importing country then becomes a follower and imposes an import tariff. This lies contrary to the previous study, which assumed that there is only one firm in each country.     

GATT TRADE RULES AND THE ENVIRONMENT

This paper addresses the alleged conflict between the GATT trade rules and the protection of the environment by GATT members. The author contends that the principal objective of the GATT rules on nontariff trade restrictions is to eliminate government interventions that promote the commercial interests of domestic producers and consumers in a manner that discriminates against foreign producers and consumers in either domestic or international markets. He further contends that this objective fundamentally does not conflict with protecting GATT members' domestic environment or the global environment. The GATT should explicitly recognize the objectives of environmental protection and natural resource consemation, either by an amendment to the GATT Articles or by resolution of the GATT Council. GATT members, in the interest of protecting their national and the global environment, should be free to impose restrictions on imports or exports so long as the interventions conform to the following conditions: (i) restrictions do not have the intent or signficant effect of discriminating against foreign producers or consumers in favor of domestic ones, (ii) restrictions are in the interest of protecting the global environment where the concerns are widely shared by other nations and do not simply reflect unique and parochial views of the individual member, and (iii) restrictions do not constitute an effort to force trading partners to adopt environmental standards of production that have no global or trans-border pollution implications .     

Temporary Bottlenecks,Hydropower and Acquisitions*

We apply a model with four markets, two regions and two time periods, to study the effects of an acquisition in a hydropower system with temporary bottlenecks. The effect on welfare is found to be ambiguous. In some instances an acquisition leads to larger differences in prices between markets, which gives rise to an increase in deadweight loss. In other instances it leads to a reduction in price differences between markets, particularly if the dominant firm acquires a firm which was active in the market where the dominant firm used to dump its production before the acquisition.     

中国实施TBT的必要性文献综述

经过关贸总协定/世界贸易组织（GATT/WTO）等国际组织的多年努力,关税水平有了大幅度的削减,与此同时,一些传统的非关税壁垒也被纳入了规范管理行列,使得这些壁垒对本国的进口保护作用日趋下降。作为发展中国家的中国是否应该设置技术贸易壁垒（TBT）,从而保护人们的财产安全,是一个亟待解决的问题。     

Concessional Amnesty and the Politics of Immigration Reforms

This paper establishes a political support model of immigration reforms. The analysis highlights the distinction between border enforcement and employer sanction measures in that the former can be more aptly characterized as an income transfer from employer to native labor interests, whereas the latter generates deadweight losses that are borne entirely by producers. We show that while amnesty may appear to run contrary to the original intent of the immigration reform, it may nevertheless facilitate rent capture by the politician by "wiping the slate clean" and reducing the deadweight loss of employer sanction measures.     

Trade Taxes and Welfare: The Case of Export Incentives in South-East Asian Countries

It is now widely recognised that the distortions common in many developing countries lead to a bias against exporting. In consequence many governments have begun to provide export incentives aimed at compensating for this bias. This article begins by examining the range of such incentives offered in South-East Asian countires. It then goes on to use the standard theory of the second-best to develop a simple framework within which these policies can be assessed. The difficulties encountered in constructing a system of export incentives that will not introduce distortions of their own are highlighted. The constraints imposed by GATT obligations are also noted.     

ENDOGENOUS PROTECTION IN A TRADE LIBERALIZING ECONOMY: THE CASE OF SOUTH AFRICA

This article aims to establish the changes that occurred in the institutional structures governing trade policy in South Africa during the period 1990–1998. It also examines the forces that influenced the application of tariff policy by the major tariff-setting bodies by applying various theories of endogenous protection to their decisions. Using firm-level data on applications made to the Board on Tariffs and Trade, the study finds that when estimating a probit model, employment considerations rather than capital invested influenced the board's decisions to grant protection. In addition, the board is found to have granted protection even in the face of tariff lines having been bound under the Uruguay Round. The article argues that this should not be interpreted as a reversal of the trade liberalization but rather as an attempt by the board to cushion firms from the acceleration in the tariff rationalization process that occurred after the GATT offer. Finally, it is suggested that the board's response to changes in import penetration ratios between industries that were considered organized provides prima facie evidence of the superior lobbying ability of such industries.     

Measuring the impact of trade flows on employment in the Turkish manufacturing industry

This paper investigates the impact of export and import flows on the change in manufacturing employment using an accounting-identity based approach which enables the change in employment to be decomposed into the contribution made not only by trade but also by domestic consumption and productivity change. The analysis is carried over (i) four subperiods, two belonging to the period before 1980 when Turkey switched from a regime of import-substitution based growth to one of export-orientation, and the other two, to the period after 1980, and (ii) three tradebased categories; net exporting, import competing and noncompeting sectors. It is found (a) that trade has a more significant role to play in employment change in the post-1980 periods, (b) that this is observed more in the net exporting and noncompeting categories rather than the import competing category, and (c) that the switch to export-oriented growth in 1980 did not lead to export-based employment to be dominant in employment changes but has acted as a buffer in the sense that employment may either have grown much less or declined more severely if the post-1980 expansion of exports had not occurred.     

Importing exporters and exporting importers: A study of the decision of Chinese firms to engage in international trade

This paper examines the complex and interdependent relationship between importing and exporting for a panel of Chinese manufacturing firms. We estimate the decision to import and export simultaneously within a dynamic random‐effects bivariate probit framework addressing the endogenous initial conditions problem. Results show that decisions to export and import are simultaneously determined and that sunk‐entry costs play a significant role in a firm's decision to enter international markets. Costs are larger for exporting. We also find a substitution effect between the two decisions. The substitutability between exporting and importing is greater for financially constrained private firms.     

THE (HIDDEN) COST OF EMPLOYER PARKING POLICIES*

It has been argued that distortionary tax policies, which stipulate that employer parking is not taxed as a benefit in kind, as well as minimum parking requirements induce welfare losses. Using Dutch data, we show that current tax policies induce welfare losses of about 10% of employer parking resource costs. Hypothetical minimum parking requirements for employers, at levels currently applied in the United States, induce an additional deadweight loss of 18% of employer parking resource costs.     

EXPORT‐MARKET DYNAMICS AND THE PROBABILITY OF FIRM CLOSURE: EVIDENCE FOR THE UNITED KINGDOM

This study presents the first empirical analysis of the determinants of firm closure in the United Kingdom with an emphasis on the role of export‐market dynamics, using panel data for a nationally representative group of firms operating in all‐market‐based sectors during 1997–2003. Our findings show that the probability of closure is (cet. par.) significantly lower for exporters, particularly those experiencing export‐market entry and exit. Having controlled for other attributes associated with productivity (such as size and export status), the following factors are found to increase the firm's survival prospects: higher capital intensity and TFP, foreign ownership, young age, displacement effects (through relatively high rates of entry of firms in each industry), and belonging to certain industries. Interestingly, increased import penetration (a proxy for lower trade costs) leads to a lower hazard rate for exporting entrants and continuous exporters, while inducing a higher hazard rate for domestic producers or those that quit exporting.     

WTO Exceptions as Insurance

The paper formalizes the notion that GATT exceptions such as antidumping and escape clause actions can act as insurance for import competing sectors affected by adverse price shocks. The authors use a general‐equilibrium model with several import competing sectors and assume incomplete markets so that agents cannot contract insurance. It is shown that sector‐specific contingent protection measures are superior to uniform contingent tariffs as an insurance mechanism. A tax‐cum‐subsidy policy (i.e., taxing all sectors in order to subsidize the shocked sector) also improves welfare and is superior to contingent protection.