The Effect of the Arab Spring on Preferences for Redistribution in Egypt

This paper investigates the effect of the revolution that occurred in January 2011 in Egypt on the demand for redistribution in that country, which has drastically increased since that period. This shock has been an important event, enhancing freedom and the political structure. In a first step, taking into account the main determinants of preferences for redistribution in the literature, our results differ, showing a positive impact of religion and a negative impact of altruistic attitudes. In a second step, we rely on a diff-in-diff approach to estimate the effect of the revolution, using three similar countries as a control group. We find that Egyptians became much more favorable to redistribution after the Arab Spring. Moreover, the revolution effect is stronger for the poorest people and those who are interested in politics.     

The influence of international trade on labour productivity in services: The case of Brazil in the 1990s

In the developing world, services account for a rising share of domestic employment and international trade. Thus, it is important to know whether trade liberalization contributes to labour productivity in services. We explore this question, examining the 1990–2000 Brazilian trade liberalization. We find that growth of imports and exports strengthened labour productivity in services, but the contribution was smaller in subsectors with more college graduates, and this negative offset was larger in subsectors that received large foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows. Improved access to imported manufactured intermediate inputs raised downstream services' labour productivity and downstream manufacturing firms benefitting from tariff cuts enacted by trade partners generated spillovers that improved the labour productivity of upstream service subsectors. However, FDI inflows and investments in human and physical capital modified these downstream factors. We conclude that the Brazilian trade liberalization strengthened productivity in services, but unequally across subsectors.     

The relationship between remittances and macroeconomic variables in times of political and social upheaval: Evidence from Tunisia's Arab Spring

If Tunisia is hailed as a success story with its high rankings on economic, educational, and other indicators relative to other Arab countries, the popular 2011 uprisings underscored the fragility of its main economic pillars, including those of tourism and foreign direct investment. This paper examines the economic impact of migrants’ remittances, which are expected to exhibit relatively countercyclical behaviour during periods of intense upheaval. This study is novel in its methodological approach, which is used to pinpoint the dynamic effects of remittances on key macroeconomic variables within an unstable framework. The analysis reveals that the effect of remittances on Tunisia's economy has varied over time. Prior to the Arab Spring, remittances had a short‐term negative influence on economic growth, varying effects on domestic investment and positive impacts on consumption. In considering the post‐Arab uprisings, positive and strong impacts of remittances on growth and consumption are found in the long run while negative and moderate investment effects of remittances are shown over the short and medium term.     

The heterogeneous effect of finance on international trade

Is the impact of financial development on international trade heterogeneous – being positive, negative or null – across manufacturing sectors? And is it dependent on the level of sectoral requirement on external finance for capital need? To examine these questions this article uses a panel trade database on 21 manufacturing sectors in 80 countries between 2000 and 2009. The analysis demonstrates that the effect of financial development on trade is indeed heterogeneous by estimating a coefficient for each sector and showing that the signs and significance levels vary across them. The article also demonstrates that sectors with strong reliance on external finance export higher volume from countries with developed financial system and that financial development reduces trade in industries with low financial dependence level.     

Does political instability affect exchange rates in Arab Spring countries?

This article investigates the dynamic relationship between political instability and exchange rates in five Arab Spring countries over the period 1992Q1–2016Q4. We include macroeconomic fundamentals to identify the transmission channels through which political instability may affect exchange rates. Based on VAR and ARDL models, our results report that political instability is associated with a significant drop in the value of domestic currencies of these countries. Economic growth is found to be the key mechanism channel. We find also that the dependence between variables is more emphasized in the short run than in the long run.     

Competition and price dispersion in the airline markets

We use two ticket-level data sets on one-way domestic flights for the US airlines to examine the potentially nonlinear relationship between price dispersion and three forms of competition: inter-firm, inter-flight and frequency competitions. The linear relationship is rejected at any conventional significance levels. In particular, there is an S-shaped relationship between market concentration and price dispersion. This can be a reason for the mixed results in the literature. Roughly speaking, the inter-flight and frequency competitions have opposite effects on price dispersion. Finally, in general, the size of aircraft has a positive effect on price. However, for very large aircraft, the relationship becomes negative.     

A re-analysis of the trade and welfare effects of export subsidies

This article proposes a new analysis of the market and welfare effects of export subsidies. Current analysis uses a default assumption of imports being prohibited by the exporting country. We contend that this assumption fails on several fronts: it is not consistent with the ceteris paribus assumption used in economic analysis; it is unrealistic in a world of fast-dropping transportation costs and free trade; and it hides the true effect of an export subsidy which is to create inefficient intra-industry trade. Correcting the analysis is important as, even with a proliferation of treaties, governments continue to enact policies to promote trade that may have similar effects to an export subsidy. Proceeding at a basic level, this article presents graphical analysis of export subsidies to replace the content in current undergraduate textbooks, in order to train the next generation of economists to think clearly about the effects of this policy.     

Exploring the boundaries of services trade

The level of international trade in services is relatively low. This can be the consequence of policy barriers and regulations or it may be due to the nature of products produced in the services sector. To understand the relative importance of both factors, this article uses data for Scottish bilateral services exports and imports to the UK to estimate theory-based trade costs for a wide range of sectors for two economic regions that are almost perfectly integrated. The results of this analysis provide important insights for future trade policy by identifying those narrowly defined industries which are more tradable by nature and have the potential to expand internationally.     

The impact of cultural exceptions: audiovisual services trade and trade policy

Audiovisual services such as music and movies in digital formats have gained substantial importance over the last decade, while remaining one of the sectors with the lowest number of commitments by WTO members. Based on a novel data set, this article analyses the role of trade restrictions on audiovisual services in a gravity model. We find that countries with WTO commitments trade more audiovisual services, while both exports and imports are lower for countries which impose policies to curb inflows of foreign cultural services.     

Impacts of price variations on the balance of world trade

A standard mathematical model of a trade market is considered, and the concept of an acceptable state of the market is introduced, which takes into account the requirements of all the partners. To evaluate the ‘distance’ between the acceptable and current states of the market, a special mathematical approach is developed. This approach has been found useful for correcting the price vector to bring the states closer together.     

基于国际贸易专业的本科英语教学思考

随着经济全球化进程的加快,对国际商务人员的英语也有着越来越高的要求,所以,高校中国际贸易专业学生的英语教学工作也显得越来越重要。我国高校教学改革的出发点和目的是学科知识和语言能力的＂双丰收＂。以认知心理学为基础,思考现阶段国贸专业的英语教学是高校教师的关注点,其中十分注重根据国贸专业学生学习外语的特点对专业用途英语教学（ESP）进行研究。     

国际贸易学科发展前沿问题研究综述

随着全球经济一体化的不断深入,国际贸易及其学科发展越发重要。基于此,从学科及专业的定位问题、人才培养目标和模式、专业课程体系设置、教学模式及手段四个方面对现有研究成果进行了总结与梳理,从而为高校培养具有＂扎实专业知识、高技能综合素质、应用型的国际贸易专业人才＂提供理论指导。     

电子商务对国际贸易发展的影响及我国的应对策略研究

国际电子商务在经济全球化和全球信息化过程中得到迅猛发展,而其本身的发展又极大地推动了国际贸易的发展。因此,就国际电子商务的发展对国际贸易的影响及我国的应对策略进行分析与研究,并从政府、企业两方面提出应对策略。     

中国农产品贸易现状及对策分析

中国是世界主要的农产品生产国与出口国,也是重要的农产品消费大国。农产品的生产、流通与消费水平决定了中国的国民经济发展水平。随着全球经济的发展,尤其是加入WTO後,中国的农产品贸易面临着前所未有的挑战。中国的农产品在国际市场上竞争力下降,出口屡屡碰壁,面临诸多制约因素。因此只有从政府、农民与企业等多方面进行调整才能促进中国农产品贸易更好地发展。     

农产品贸易保护的国际政治经济学分析

世贸组织多哈回合的坎昆会议上农产品贸易谈判的失败,集中体现出对外贸易政策的本质是其本国国内政治经济的反映。农产品的特点和作用以及农业的特殊地位决定了发达国家在农产品贸易中的高保护政策。对农产品贸易保护的国际政治经济学视角的分析能够使我们更好地了解发达国家在贸易谈判中的观点和立场。     

服务地方经济的国际贸易本科应用型人才培养模式构建探讨

人才培养模式是在教育思想指导下,按照特定的培养目标和人才规格,以相对稳定的教学内容和课程体系实施人才培养的总和。分析了服务地方经济的国际贸易本科应用型人才培养模式的构建思路,并构建了服务地方经济的国际贸易本科应用型培养模式,最后提出了国际贸易本科应用型培养模式的保障措施。这对培养服务地方经济的国际贸易应用型人才具有重要的意义。     

Out in the cold? Iceland's trade performance outside the European Union and European Monetary Union

Although entering currency (and customs) unions involve bothcosts and benefits, an increasing body of research is findingthat the benefits—in terms of international trade creation—areremarkably large. Focusing simply on the European Monetary Union(EMU) rather than the broad range of currency unions studiedby other authors, we find that the trade impact of EMU is smaller,but still substantial. Our findings suggest that the Iceland'strade could increase by about 60% and that the trade-to-GDPratio could rise by 12 percentage points should Iceland jointhe European Union and EMU.     

Integration and transition: Scenarios for the location of production and trade in Europe

Applying a newly developed CGE-model, we present scenarios for the future economic geography of Europe. The model divides the world into ten regions, five of which are European, and 14 industries, of which 12 are imperfectly competitive. With a complete input-output structure, the model captures comparative advantage mechanisms as well as intra-industry trade and 'new economic geography' agglomeration forces. The simulations focus on the consequences of successful transformation in Eastern Europe. The results indicate that transformation and European integration are of great importance for Eastern Europe, while the overall effects for other European regions are small. Individual sectors in the EU, such as Textiles and Transport Equipment, are, however, in some cases strongly affected.
JEL classification: C68, F12, F17, R11.     

On the possibility of attaining environmental and trade objectives simultaneously

With the greening of political debate around the world, large nations — precluded from using trade instruments explicitly — have become aware of the fact that they can manipulate their domestic tax structure to attain environmental and trade objectives simultaneously. In this note we show how such nations can attain these two targets with one instrument. Specifically, we show how to construct dual purpose taxes. We then focus on the empirical determinants of these taxes.     

The long-run decline in the share of agricultural and food products in international trade: a gravity equation approach to its causes

The objective of this study is to determine the causes of the loss of share of agricultural products and food in international trade. The article compares, using a gravity model, the impact of various factors upon bilateral trade in agricultural products, in manufactures and in total trade, between 1963 and 2000 for a representative sample of 40 countries. The results clearly demonstrate how the low demand elasticity for agricultural products and food, the high degree of protectionism to which they were subjected and their meagre share in intra-industrial trade are the principal causes of their relatively slow growth.