Computational Analysis of the Menu of US‐Japan Trade Policies

We have used the Michigan Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) Model of World Production and Trade to calculate the aggregate welfare and sectoral employment effects of the menu of US‐Japan trade policies. The menu of policies encompasses the various preferential US and Japan bilateral and regional free trade agreements (FTAs) negotiated and in process, unilateral removal of existing trade barriers and global (multilateral) free trade. The welfare impacts of the FTAs on the United States and Japan are shown to be rather small in absolute and relative terms. The sectoral employment effects are also generally small but vary across the individual sectors depending on the patterns of the bilateral liberalisation. The welfare effects on the FTA partner countries are mostly positive though generally small, but there are some indications of potentially disruptive employment shifts in some partner countries. There are indications of trade diversion and detrimental welfare effects on non‐member countries for some of the FTAs analysed. In comparison to the welfare gains from the US and Japan bilateral FTAs, the gains from both unilateral trade liberalisation by the United States, Japan and the FTA partners, and from global (multilateral) free trade are shown to be rather substantial and more uniformly positive for all countries in the global trading system. The US and Japan FTAs are based on ‘hub’ and ‘spoke’ arrangements. We show that the spokes emanate out in different and often overlapping directions, suggesting that the complex of bilateral FTAs may create distortions of the global trading system.     

美国和墨西哥在CUSTA和NAFTA中的贸易增长效应

本文选用美国和墨西哥1981-2007年间按SITC一位数商品分类的双边贸易数据,修正了Magee(2004)的进口需求方程,运用反事实估计方法和GLS回归方法对美国和墨西哥在CUSTA和NAFTA中贸易流变化进行回归分析,测定并比较两种一体化协定给美国和墨西哥带来的贸易增长效应。结果显示:NAFTA给经济水平较发达的美国带来了进口的大量增长,有利于美国的福利增加,并且这种福利的增加是稳定的,而对墨西哥的贸易增长效应却长期为负值;在不同商品类别中,两种一体化协定的效应不同,其中在一些商品类别中具有负效应且绝对值较大。所以,发展中国家参与南北型经济一体化时应该更多地关注其动态福利效应。     

Trade Remedy Actions in NAFTA: Agriculture and Agri‐Food Industries

The economic rationale for trade remedy law, while always weak, is undermined by the formation of free trade areas. However, due to political pressure, first CUSFTA and then NAFTA have continued the use of domestic antidumping and countervailing duty laws. With the lowering of border protection, it was feared that there would be an explosion of trade remedy law as NAFTA was implemented. This article examines data on the use of anti‐dumping and countervailing duty investigations in agriculture, and analyses the incidence between NAFTA partners before and after the implementation of free trade, and compared to the incidence with other countries. Given the cost of current AD and CVD suits, options are explored for alternative methods to resolve AD and CVD suits. Evaluation of options hinges on goals held for dispute resolution within NAFTA. Given continued political opposition to eliminating AD and CVD processes, increasing the options for resolving these suits may reduce their overall costs.     

Assessing the Impacts of US‐Japan Bilateral Trade Agreements, 1980–1995

The paper presents three different viewpoints on the effects of US‐Japan bilateral trade agreements and finds some evidence to support each one using trade data from 1980–1995. For most of the 25 industry‐agreement cases, the data do not support a conclusion of significant positive impacts of the agreements on Japan's imports of targeted manufactured products from either the US or non‐US sources. In at least one high‐profile case involving autos, I find evidence suggesting positive impacts on imports from the US, but in this case the data suggests trade diversion benefiting US0based producers at the expense of European ones. I also find a few cases where the agreements may have produced positive effects on Japan's imports from non‐US sources.     

Preference Erosion,Government Revenues and Non‐tariff Trade Barriers

Developing countries benefiting from developed country unilateral trade preferences fear that Doha Round tariff cuts will erode the value of those preferences. That these programmes confer significant benefits, however, is not clear. Studies indicate that the impact of preference erosion would be minimal for most developing countries. But for a small subset of middle‐income and least‐developed countries, concern may be warranted. WTO members, should address affected countries’ concerns, perhaps by tailoring WTO tariff negotiations to lessen adjustment pressures and providing development assistance. Developing countries also are anxious that lower tariffs will reduce government revenues. Dependence on tariff revenue is diminishing and trade liberalisation need not result in lower total tax revenues or even lower customs revenues. Much depends on a country's current tariff and trade regime, its tax structure and its overall economic structure. At some point, a country does need to broaden its tax base and look to other revenue sources to offset declining tariff revenues. Tax reform, therefore, complements trade reform. A third area of developing country concern is non‐tariff barriers (NTBs), which may limit market access even after tariffs are reduced. Despite prior WTO work in this area, NTBs remain a thorny issue for all WTO members.     

The NAFTA and the Environment: Trade,diplomacy, and limited protection

This article reviews the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and its provisions on environmental protection. It describes how NAFTA followed from previous international environmental and trade arrangements. NAFTA's environmental provision adopts the position that economic growth will promote environmental protection and that enforcement is best accomplished through diplomatic means rather than through trade sanctions. The major importance of NAFTA's treatment of the environment is the precedent it sets to include environmental issues into future trade treaties.     

Trade Reform and Poverty: The Case of Mexico

We use a two‐step computationally simple procedure to analyse the effects of Mexico's's potential unilateral tariff liberalisation on real incomes. First, we use the CGE model provided by the Global Trade Analysis Project (GTAP) as the new price generator. Second, we apply the price changes to Mexican household data in order to assess the effects of the policy simulation on poverty and income distribution. Although Mexico widely liberalised most of its imports by the mid 90s, one salient feature is its membership in the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) with Canada and United States. By choosing GTAP as the price generator, we are able to model the differential tariff structure. Even starting with a low level of tariff protection, simulation results show that the impact of tariff reform on welfare will be positive in general for all expenditure deciles. We find that, when we assume non‐homothetic individual preferences, trade liberalisation benefits people in the poorer deciles more than those in the richer ones.     

Declining Distance Effects in International Trade: Some Country‐Level Evidence

Technical progress can be expected to reduce transport costs over time, yet most studies of bilateral trade based on the gravity model find distance effects to be increasing rather than decreasing. We investigate countries' openness to international trade (the ratio of exports plus imports to GDP). We find that trade decreases with geographical remoteness, land area and lack of access to the sea, all of which are likely to be correlated with transport costs. In contrast to the results obtained with log‐linear models of bilateral trade, distance effects (remoteness and land area) have declined over time. Trade decreases with population density and increases with improvements in the terms of trade, investment and a more liberal trade policy.     

Gains and Losses from Preferential Trade Agreements: Some Evidence from NAFTA

In this article we integrate two topics in international trade policy that have received (separately) a lot of attention: the effects of regional trade blocs, and export pessimism regarding poorer countries. The specific issue that allows us to bring together these questions is whether regional integration adversely affects non-members. We use quarterly data on bilateral trade flows for the period 1990 through 1997 to examine U.S. imports from its NAFTA partners as well as from non-NAFTA trade partners, and more specifically, those countries expected to be hurt by NAFTA. Two measures are used:

1. “import penetration” or imports from a particular source as a share of US GDP, and

2. the income elasticity of expenditure on imports from a particular source. Both “import penetration” and the income elasticity of expenditure affect the export earnings of U.S. trade partners, a matter of particular concern for developing countries.

The broadest pattern observed in the income-expenditure elasticities is clear evidence of increased penetration by non-oil developing countries. This is in marked contrast to the stable GDP share and expenditure elasticity for developed country imports. Regional results suggest that the Caribbean and the East Asian NICs were the only area groupings that experienced a reduction in income-expenditure elasticity. But overall on the basis of U.S. income-expenditure elasticities it appears that the first four years of NAFTA were associated with trade expansion rather than trade diversion.     

Patterns of Self-Efficacy Within NAFTA: United States,Canada, and Mexico

Self-efficacy has been shown to be a key attribute of successful business leaders and in today's global economy, must be studied in terms of patterns of crossvergence. The paper examines both individual characteristics (gender, age, work experience, and management experience) and culture as they relate to self-efficacy in North America. Women in our sample had slightly lower self-efficacy, which increased with work and management experience. Age and membership in an individualistic culture were not related to self-efficacy; in fact, our Mexican participants demonstrated slightly higher self-efficacy propensities. These results suggest that organizations might consider devoting special attention to development of mentor and other programs particularly to females initiating their career. However, expected cultural patterns relating to self-efficacy might not hold as strongly, particularly with empowered groups such as executives and MBA students. Individual characteristics, particularly experience levels, have a greater impact on self-efficacy and should receive heightened considerations when organizations are making selection and other personnel decisions.     

墨西哥贸易政策审议

<正> 墨西哥第三次贸易政策审议进展顺利,本次审议全面而且深入,并为贸易问题的研究工作提供了众多资料和借鉴。委员们赞赏了墨西哥近年来经济上的成效。墨西哥在贸易和投资自由化方面的努力带动了贸易和投资的显著高涨,是促使墨西哥经济进步和繁荣的关键因素。同时,墨西     

Mexico and China:Strategic Trade Parthers

In recent years,trade between Mexico and China has grown dynamically with an average annual growth of 36.7%.Mexico and China are both major world economies and China is the second largest trading partner of Mexico.Our two countries have been committed to deepening strategic partnership,cementing the basis for cooperation in all areas with fruitful outcome achieved.     

李嘉图国际贸易理论的新兴古典分析--交易效率、偏好对国际贸易的影响

李嘉图的比较成本理论作为国际贸易理论不可动摇的基础,具有重要的理论价值。而新兴古典贸易理论的发展,为解释国内贸易和国际贸易提供了一个统一的理论框架。其核心在于该理论独特的分析工具:超边际分析方法。采用新兴古典经济学的超边际分析方法,引入交易效率和偏好,对李嘉图的国际贸易理论进行新的分析,可以得出很多有价值的结论。本文通过建立同时存在李嘉图外生比较技术差异和交易成本的新兴古典模型,探讨了交易效率和偏好对国际贸易的影响。为贸易政策的制定提供了理论依据。一国在制定对外贸易政策时,应从改变交易效率、偏好结构的角度出发,制定有利于本国的贸易政策,从而改善其外贸条件,进一步促进其国际贸易的发展。     

Trade Creation and Diversion Effects of Regional Trade Agreements: A Product‐level Analysis

This paper examines the impacts of regional trade agreements (RTAs) on trade flows at product level, with a particular focus on trade creation and diversion. Based on estimation of the gravity equation, dealing with the zero trade flows and endogeneity bias problems, we analyse the impacts of various types of RTAs involving 67 countries for 20 products during the 1980–2006 period. We find that RTAs among developing countries tend to cause trade diversion compared with RTAs among developed countries. Taking the higher external tariff rates of developing countries compared with developed countries into consideration, our results suggest trade diversion is likely to be caused by remaining high tariffs on imports from non‐members. In addition, we find the trade creation effect for many products in the cases of Customs Unions and plurilateral RTAs. These results imply that trade creation would be caused by various factors besides the reduction in tariff rates. Based on these results, we draw a policy implication that external tariff rate reduction is an important factor in avoiding trade diversion in the formation of RTAs, in particular for RTAs among developing countries, while a large number of members and the common external tariff appear to be important for generating the trade creation effect.     

中国和墨西哥贸易关系的实证分析

本文通过对中国和墨西哥双方的经贸关系进行实证分析,探讨双方究竟在多大程度上存在着竞争关系,双方有无合作的可能性。主要结论是中国和墨西哥在某些领域存在着事实上的竞争关系,但是合作的前景也很广阔。     

Trade and Wages: Two Puzzles from Mexico

Mexico plays an important role in the developing‐country trade‐liberalisation literature because it liberalised early and extensively. Numerous papers analysed changes in Mexican wage levels and inequality after Mexico joined the GATT in 1986. This paper reviews recent papers that analyse changes in wage levels and inequality since the North American Free Trade Agreement in 1994. Two main puzzles emerge. First, wage growth rates are similar before and after NAFTA. Second, Mexican wage inequality, which received much attention after its post‐GATT rise, falls steadily after NAFTA. This paper reviews several possible explanations for these two phenomena.     

US–Euro Area Monetary Policy Interdependence: New Evidence from Taylor Rule‐based VECMs

(1227) Ansgar Belke and Yuhua Cui This paper analyses the monetary policy interdependence between the European Central Bank (ECB) and the Federal Reserve (Fed) for the period 1999–2006. Two models are specified: a partial vector error correction model (VECM) and a general VECM. In the partial VECM, we look for a long‐run interdependent relationship between the interest rates of the two currency areas and specify the Taylor Rule terms as exogenous variables. In the general VECM, we regard all variables as endogenous, and look for long‐run equilibrium relationships among them, which may reveal monetary policy interdependence between the two central banks. Weak exogeneity is checked in both models in order to establish a possible leader–follower relationship. The empirical results of both models indicate interdependence between the ECB and the Fed, but only the general VECM testifies a leader–follower pattern between the two central banks. According to this pattern, the ECB does follow the Fed.     

The Effect of Aggregation Bias: An NTB‐modelling Analysis of Turkey's Agro‐food Trade with the EU

We explore how different data aggregation levels affect the gravity estimates of non‐tariff barriers (NTBs) in the agro‐food sector, and we examine their related impacts on policy simulations of an expansion to the European Union (EU) that would include Turkey. We calculate two sets of ad valorem equivalents (AVEs) of NTBs using the gravity approach to disaggregated and aggregated Central Product Classification data for 15 Global Trade Analysis Project (GTAP) agro‐food sectors. We find that the AVEs of NTBs vary substantially across products and that using aggregated data primarily results in greater effects of NTBs. In a second step, we incorporate the AVEs of NTBs into the GTAP model to evaluate Turkey's EU membership and conclude that aggregation bias has considerable effects on both the estimation of NTBs and the general equilibrium simulation results. Utilising different data aggregation levels leads to a great variability of trade costs of NTBs and, hence, to misleading trade and welfare effects.