Regionalism in the nineties: what effect on trade?

We apply a gravity model to 1980–1996 annual nonfuel imports data for 58 countries to quantify the effects of recently created or revamped PTAs on trade. We modify the gravity equation to identify separate effects of PTAs on intrabloc trade, members’ total imports and their total exports and to test for significant changes in trade patterns following the creation of trade blocs. We find no indication that ‘new regionalism’ boosted intrabloc trade significantly and we find trade diversion only for the EU and EFTA. The latter also exhibit ‘export diversion’, which could indicate their imposing welfare costs on other countries. Latin American trade liberalization in the 1990s had a positive impact on bloc members’ imports and, usually, exports.     

碳关税对世界经济和农产品贸易的影响研究

采用GTAP 8.0模拟欧盟、美国、日本分别和同时征收碳关税时对世界经济和产品贸易的影响。结果表明：碳关税将对世界经济均衡增长产生负面影响,受影响最大的是中国、金砖和东盟国家;碳关税将改变世界贸易结构和贸易利益格局,发达国家受益、发展中国家受损;碳关税将使世界农产品出口总额小幅下降,但对改善世界农产品贸易结构具有积极作用。     

Trade creation and diversion revisited: Accounting for model uncertainty and natural trading partner effects

The effect of preferential trade agreements (PTAs) on trade flows is subject to model uncertainty stemming from the diverse and even contradictory effects suggested by the theoretical PTA literature. The existing empirical literature has produced remarkably disparate results and the wide variety of empirical approaches reflects the uncertainty about the ‘correct’ set of explanatory variables that ought to be included in the analysis. To account for the model uncertainty that surrounds the validity of the competing PTA theories, we introduce Bayesian model averaging (BMA) to the PTA literature. Statistical theory shows that BMA successfully incorporates model uncertainty in linear regression analysis by minimizing the mean squared error, and by generating predictive distributions with optimal predictive performance. Once model uncertainty is addressed as part of the empirical strategy, we find strong evidence of trade creation, trade diversion, and open bloc effects. Our results are robust to a range of alternative empirical specifications proposed by the recent PTA literature. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Exchange rate volatility and fluctuations in the extensive margin of trade

The existing evidence for exporters׳ entry and exit in response to exchange rate movements is based on either low frequency data or a sample with large devaluations. Using quarterly data of U.S. bilateral trade with 99 countries, this study provides new evidence that the extensive margin of trade fluctuates over the business cycle. First, I show that the extensive margin of exports to the U.S. and the extensive margin of imports from the U.S. are more volatile than the output of almost all trading partners. Next, I find that fixing exchange rates with the U.S. dollar, having a free trade agreement with the U.S., and an increase in country size is significantly associated with the stability of the pattern of trade with the U.S.     

The micro evolution of trade and turnover in Turkey under the global crisis

We provide evidence on the effects of the 2009 crisis on Turkish manufacturing. The exploration of firm and firm-product extensive and intensive margins confirms the prevalence of the latter in the fall of export sales and discloses the former's relevance in the dramatic import contraction. The analysis of firm and product heterogeneity reveals that productivity drove the negative evolution of the export intensive margin to such an extent that it significantly affected trade extensive margins and postponable goods were the most affected products. In addition, the foreign demand shock suffered by exporters propagated to their import demand. Interestingly, we show that the crisis hit produced exports less than the carry-along ones and that the domestic market cushioned the downturn effects especially for larger firms. This hints at the importance of domestic counter-cyclical policies.     

A study of intellectual property protection policies and innovation in the Indian pharmaceutical industry and beyond

We study the relationship between Trade Related Intellectual Property rights (TRIPS) and innovation. Using export data, this paper aims at assessing the relative impact of TRIPs on innovation, namely the ability of the Indian pharmaceutical industry to enter new markets with existing or new drugs. It examines whether India’s decision to comply with TRIPS influenced its innovation, and develops a theoretical model, where innovation, being measured by the likelihood of exports of one product from one identified country to partner countries, is influenced by factor, demand and trade conditions. The paper draws on quantitative data, using Probit and Logit techniques. The model is illustrated using empirical evidence from the Indian pharmaceutical industry. We find statistically significant evidence that India’s compliance with TRIPS is associated with new trade flows from India to partners. However we do not find statistically significant evidence of a relation between TRIPS compliance and value of exports. The interpretation is that TRIPS compliance has different effects: it is a necessary condition to favor innovation but it is not sufficient to increase exports value (competitiveness). Finally, we study to what extent this model can be generalized to other developing countries and/or industries.     

中国普惠金融发展对贸易边际及结构的影响

研究目标：考察中国普惠金融发展对贸易边际及结构的影响。研究方法：首先从理论上探讨了普惠金融发展对于贸易的影响,提出普惠制金融发展不仅会从集约边际和扩展边际两个方面影响贸易的规模,而且会因为行业间外部融资依赖度的差异而影响贸易的结构。然后,运用我国10个省份15个制造行业2004~2013年的数据,检验了普惠金融发展对于地区出口的影响。研究发现：普惠金融的发展对于出口总体上具有促进作用,不过,普惠金融对于出口的影响在行业上具有显著的异质性,总体来说,在外部融资依赖度较高的行业,普惠金融发展对于出口呈现出较多正向影响,而在外部融资依赖度较低的行业,普惠金融发展对于出口越多呈现出较多负向影响。研究创新：理论上研究了普惠金融发展与国际贸易边际的关系,并运用中国的数据进行了验证。研究价值：对于促进中国普惠金融体系的构建和贸易转型升级具有一定的政策启示。     

Foreign and domestic growth drivers in Eastern Europe

This paper analyses the growth effects of capital formation, exports and FDI as major, drivers of economic development in Eastern Europe. The fundamental innovations are, identified by empirically and theoretically motivated short- and long-run restrictions in, structural cointegrated vector autoregressions. Impulse responses and variance, decompositions reveal quite different growth effects in various Eastern European countries. Generally, a strong reliance on exports goes along with higher GDP, and FDI bears, substantial potential for fostering economic growth. It is shown that the recent worldwide, recession clearly hit Eastern Europe through the export channel, whereas the recovery is, mainly supported by positive demand shocks.     

Export differentiation in transition economies

I investigate changes in the structure of trade of seventeen transition economies between 1996 and 2006, focusing on differences across three types of products - homogeneous goods, reference priced goods, and differentiated products. I examine shares of exports of each type of good, intensive and extensive margins, and the hazard of exporting. While there are cross-country differences in the distribution of export shares and in intensive and extensive margins, the largest differences exist in the hazard of exporting. There are significant differences in the hazard both across countries and time.     

Why Developing Countries Have Failed to Increase Their Exports of Agricultural Processed Products

The article uses the case study of coffee, tea and cocoa to analyse whether tariff escalation constitutes a barrier to market access that thwarts diversification efforts of developing countries into exports of value‐added agricultural processed products. It also examines the extent to which non‐tariff barriers act as market access barriers that constrain developing countries from developing their exports of agricultural processed products. Our analysis shows that tariff escalation is not the main barrier; rather it is the prevalence of non‐tariff barriers (including domestic non‐tariff barriers) that limits the ability of developing countries to increase their agricultural processed exports. This has important policy implications in terms of the emphasis that trade negotiators and policy planners should place on addressing non‐tariff barriers.     

Formula Apportionment: Factor Allocation and Tax Avoidance

This paper addresses the question of how firms react to tax incentives in a formula apportionment (FA) tax regime. Under FA, the profits of all consolidated entities of a business group are summed and then allocated according to a formula based on FA factors. We hypothesize that firms may change the allocation of real production factors and/or manipulate the FA factor through tax avoidance strategies. Analyzing FA tax effects of the German local business tax with payroll expense as the exclusive FA factor, we find empirical evidence consistent with both hypotheses. Regarding the allocation of production factors, we observe significant tax effects on labor input at the intensive margin but not on labor input at the extensive margin. In addition, we find evidence of an indirect FA spillover effect on capital investment. Our findings on tax avoidance proxies are consistent with tax-induced manipulations of payroll expense as an FA factor to save tax payments.     

Exports and cross-national corruption: A disaggregated examination

This paper empirically examines the relation between categories of exports and corruption across countries. Aggregate exports and agricultural exports tend to decrease corruption, while fuel exports increase corruption. The influence of agricultural exports in more pronounced in more corrupt nations, while fuel exports contribute to corruption in least corrupt nations. Manufacturing and ore exports, on the other hand, generally fail to show significant impacts on corruption. Our findings demonstrate that the resource curse is sensitive to prevailing corruption levels, and this finding is novel in the literature. Consistent with the extant literature, corruption decreases with income, and (at some corruption levels) as political freedom increases, and with larger government size. The findings are fairly robust to an alternate corruption measure.     

我国贸易多样性的收益分析和影响因素——基于内延边际与外延边际的考察

本研究以我国贸易多样性为研究对象,通过多国模型阐述了贸易自由化可增加多样性贸易福利;基于Feenstra(1994)的贸易多样性指数,本文给出了1995~2007年我国贸易扩张的内延边际和外延边际,2001年之后贸易的外延边际(多样性扩张)带来的贸易收益十分显著。实证结果表明,人均收入的跨国差异不利于贸易多样性的扩张,关税和非关税壁垒同样成为我国进口多样性的阻力因素,而中小企业群体规模对贸易多样性扩张的贡献作用显著。     

Does Skill Content Explain Total Trade and Intra‐Industry Trade?*

This study compares the results of skill content tests for types of trade flows under alternative assumptions about the technologies used to produce imports and exports. For trade between high‐ and middle‐income countries, we show that the match between the actual skill content of trade and that predicted by endowments in a Heckscher–Ohlin–Vanek framework improves substantially if technological heterogeneity across countries is allowed for and if the factor content of intra‐industry trade is included with that of inter‐industry trade. Endowment differences are important in explaining net trade and vertical intra‐industry trade, but not horizontal intra‐industry trade.     

Exports and International Logistics*

Better international logistics raise a developing country's exports, but the magnitude of the effect depends on the country's size. We apply a gravity model that accounts for firm heterogeneity and multilateral resistance to an international logistics index. A one standard deviation improvement in logistics is equivalent to a 14% reduction in distance. An average‐sized developing country would raise exports by approximately 36%. Most of the countries are much smaller than average, so the typical effect is 8%. This difference is chiefly due to the dampening effect of multilateral resistance, which is more important for small countries.     

中国出口增长的二元边际分解与区域差异

本文利用2000至2006年间的海关数据,从企业出口的扩展和集约边际二元视角来对中国出口增长的动力进行分解与测算。结果发现：首先,中国的出口增长主要是依靠企业出口的集约边际扩张所贡献,而扩展边际对出口增长的贡献相对较弱。加入WTO对中国出口增长的促进效应主要是通过集约边际来实现,而扩展边际的作用有限且呈现短暂性;其次,集约边际中存活率和深化率的差异是造成我国地区间出口增长差异的重要因素,越是经济发达的沿海地区越是依靠集约边际中存活率和深化率来推动出口增长。中国出口关系的持续时间非常短,平均为1.9年,且越是欠发达地区的出口关系的持续时间越是短暂;最后,通过“反事实”法测算了我国不同区域的出口增长潜力,得出提升企业出口关系的存活率和深化率是促进欠发达地区出口增长主要途径的结论。     

Estimating models of complex FDI: Are there third-country effects?

The recent general equilibrium theory of trade and multinationals emphasizes the importance of third countries and the complex integration strategies of multinationals. Little has been done to test this theory empirically. This paper attempts to rectify this situation by considering not only bilateral determinants, but also spatially weighted third-country determinants of foreign direct investment (FDI). Since the dependency among host markets is particularly related to multinationals’ trade between them, we use trade costs (distances) as spatial weights. Using panel data on U.S. industries and host countries observed over the 1989–1999 period, we estimate a “complex FDI” version of the knowledge-capital model of U.S. outward FDI by various recently developed spatial panel data generalized moments (GM) estimators. We find that third-country effects are significant, lending support to the existence of various modes of complex FDI.     

Factors of trade in Europe

We analyze how a set of determinants affect trade among European countries over the period 1992–2008. The factors encompass variables from the areas of geography, culture, institutions, infrastructure, and trade direction. Trade is analyzed for four types of goods: primary goods, parts and components, capital goods, and consumer goods. For each type of good we also distinguish its definition in terms of flows, intensive margin, and extensive margin. Methodologically, we first derive country-pair fixed effects over all possible pairs of export–import partners, and in the second stage we relate fixed effects with a set of influential factors. We show (i) the intuitive and varying effects of geographical, cultural, and institutional factors; (ii) the beneficial effects of soft and hard infrastructure; and (iii) the key importance of trade between old and new EU members.     

A Communication‐Based Theory of the Choice Between Greenfield and Acquisition Entry

This paper develops a communication‐based theory of the choice by multinational enterprises (MNEs) between greenfield and acquisition entry. It argues that MNE parents communicate with their subsidiaries for reasons of knowledge exchange, coordination, monitoring, and socialization. The expected communication costs arising from these activities are argued to increase with the verbal communication barriers existing between a prospective subsidiary and its parent, but this increase is argued to be larger for acquisitions because they require more extensive parent–subsidiary communication than greenfields. I therefore hypothesize that verbal communication barriers have positive effects on the likelihood that MNEs choose greenfield over acquisition entry. I also hypothesize that these effects are weaker for prospective subsidiaries that will have more autonomy or local co‐owners. An analysis of 231 entries by Dutch MNEs into 48 countries lends substantial support to these hypotheses, indicating that geographic and linguistic barriers to verbal communication play important roles in MNEs' establishment mode decisions.