Strategic factors for trading and investing in Latin America by U.S. businesses during the post-NAFTA era

The U.S. entered into a tripartite free trade agreement with Canada and Mexico on January 1, 1994. This scientific survey examines the strategic factors for trading and investing in Latin America, specifically Mexico, by U.S. businesses during the post-NAFTA era.Support for this research was provided by a Jacksonville State University Faculty Research Grant, 1995–96.     

The South Africa-U.S. Trade and the Real Exchange Rate: Asymmetric Evidence from 25 Industries

Previous studies that assessed the effects of exchange rate changes on the trade balance of South Africa assumed that the effects are symmetric. In this paper we violate that assumption and assess the asymmetric effects of the real rand-dollar rate on the trade balance of 25 2-digit industries that trade between South Africa and the U.S. We find short-run asymmetric effects in a total of 19 industries but short-run cumulative or impact asymmetric effects only on five industries. Short-run asymmetric effects lasted into long-run asymmetric effects on 14 industries. Further analysis revealed industries that will benefit from rand depreciation and those that will be hurt from rand appreciation.     

The Case Against a U.S.-Arms Monopoly

The U.S. government is the dominant player in the global arms market. Existing literature emphasizes the many benefits of an international U.S. government arms monopoly including: regional and global balance, stability and security, the advancement of U.S. national interests, and domestic economic benefits from international sales. The purpose of this paper is to balance this largely one-sided treatment of the U.S. government’s dominant position in the international arms market. We discuss several negative consequences and costs associated with U.S. arms sales which call into question the net benefit of the U.S. government’s control over global arms.     

全球国际收支失衡下的美国贸易

本文通过对美国外贸战略及格局的分析,指出在全球国际收支失衡下美国不是"利益受害者"。贸易逆差与储蓄-投资缺口匹配模式有助于美国抑制国内经济过热和通货膨胀,并已成为美国独特的经济增长方式。     

美元贬值对美国经常账户影响的估值效应分析

本文运用资产组合模型和协整计量方法,论证了美元汇率变化所带来的估值效应对美国经常账户调节的影响。分析结果表明,美元贬值引致的估值效应很小,再加上美元贬值可能使美国短期债务利率上升,这就很容易抵销掉贬值所带来的估值收益。因此,美国巨大的贸易赤字不可能通过美元贬值所带来的估值效应得以纠正。     

"广场协议"后的美元/日元汇率与美日双边贸易失衡

1985年"广场协议"的最主要目标是通过美元对全球主要货币特别是对日元的贬值来缩减美国的贸易逆差。然而,对1985-2006年美元/日元汇率、美日双边贸易差额等数据进行的分析说明,美元/日元汇率变动对美日双边贸易收支变动没有解释能力,美元对日元的贬值没有解决美日之间的贸易失衡问题。我们有理由相信,人民币对美元的升值也同样不能解决当代美中之间的贸易失衡问题。     

Do exchange rate changes have symmetric or asymmetric effects on the trade balance? Evidence from U.S.–Korea commodity trade

Previous studies of the effects of exchange rate changes on Korea’s trade balance have assumed symmetry between currency depreciation and appreciation. In this paper, we distinguish between the two to show that the effects at the industry level are in fact asymmetrical in most industries for Korea’s bilateral trade with the U.S. We employ an auto-regressive distributed lag (ARDL) approach using quarterly data for the period 1989–2014 for the 79 3-digit industries in which trade between Korea and the U.S. took place. Overall, our model incorporating differentiated responses for appreciation versus depreciation reveals a more significant impact of the exchange rate on commodity trade between Korea and the U.S. than a more standard model that imposes symmetry.     

Price and income elasticities: evidence from commodity trade between the U.S. and Egypt

Elasticity approach to balance of payments postulates that a country can enjoy an improvement in its trade balance in the long run if sum of import and export demand price elasticities exceed unity, a condition known as the Marshall-Lerner condition. Previous research tested this condition either using aggregate trade data between one country and rest of the world or between two countries and provided mixed results. They are all said to suffer from aggregation bias. To remove the bias, in this paper we concentrate on trade flows of two countries, i.e., the U.S. and Egypt and disaggregate their trade flows by commodity. The estimates reveal that the ML condition is met in 28 out of 36 industries that trade between the two countries.     

How Sensitive is U.S.-Canadian Trade to the Exchange Rate: Evidence from Industry Data

Previous research has followed four distinct paths to investigate the impact of currency depreciation on the trade balance of a country, using mostly aggregate trade data. In this paper we choose one of those paths and consider the trade between the U.S. and Canada. However, unlike previous research we disaggregate the trade data between the two countries by commodity and consider 152 industries that trade. After estimating inpayment and outpayment schedules for all 152 industries, we find that real depreciation has short-run effects on inpayments of 72 and outpayments of 53 industries. However, the short-run effects translate into the long-run effects only in 43 of inpayment models and 36 of outpayment models. Further analysis reveals that 1% real depreciation of the U.S. dollar has 1.29% positive effects on the U.S. net export earnings.     

The trade balance effects of U.S. foreign direct investment in Mexico

This paper examines the effect of U.S. foreign direct investment (FDI) in Mexico on U.S. exports to and imports from Mexico. The rise of intrafirm exports and imports following U.S. FDI in Mexico suggests that FDI affects trade flows. Empirical estimation proceeds with tests for stationarity and cointegration. The finding of cointegration among the variables leads to estimation of the hypothesized relationships with a vector error-correction model. Impulse response functions and variance decomposition reveal that FDI leads to increased exports and imports during the time period considered.     

中国与墨西哥加工贸易比较分析

中国自加入WTO后在美国市场进口品的占有率方面和一些产业的竞争力上已经超过了墨西哥,但中国整体出口产品价格低于墨西哥同类产品,预示着中国出口产业包括品质在内的整体竞争力略逊于墨西哥。另外,在汽车等相关产业的竞争力方面仍然无法与墨西哥抗衡。随着中国劳动力价格的逐步上涨和人民币升值等情况的出现,中国加工贸易必须进行转型升级,否则有可能在这方面被墨西哥等国家所取代。     

The potential trade effects of an FTA between the EU and Russia

The Potential Trade Effects of an FTA between the EU and Russia.- This paper analyzes some of the potential economic effects of free trade agreements between the EU and Russia and the other European CIS countries using standard indicators of trade patterns. It confirms that it would not be feasible for the EU to conclude such an agreement with Russia alone. It is also shown that, if the current high tariff levels are maintained in the CIS countries, they may not benefit from an agreement with the EU. More generally, the authors question the economic motivation for countries such as Russia in seeking free trade agreements with industrial countries which already have low levels of external protection.     

中国经常账户失衡的深层次原因探析——美国金融霸权视角

我国经常账户已连续十多年保持顺差，近几年更是呈现出逐渐升高的态势。金融霸权作为美国长期维持大量贸易逆差和资本流入的基础，正是我国出现巨额顺差的深层次原因。中国经常项目顺差是美国金融优势、强势美元政策和国家根本利益在国际收支账户上的集中表现，是由金融霸权决定的利益分配格局。在短期，我国必须坚决保护自身比较优势、坚持汇率稳步提升和多渠道消化贸易顺差。而在长期，只有建立起强大的金融产业和实现人民币国际化才能从根本上摆脱对美国金融霸权的依赖，实现我国的经济平衡。     

世界经济再平衡和美国套利

美国次贷危机引发了席卷全球的金融危机,长期的低利率货币政策和赤字财政政策是引发美国次贷危机的主要原因。贸易保护和美元贬值将是美国未来减少贸易赤字和刺激经济复苏的重要政策取向,在所谓世界经济"再平衡"过程中美国将会实现双向套利。作为持有大量美元外汇资产的美国最大逆差国,中国应该保持人民币与美元汇率的稳定,逐步减持美元债券,加快生产与贸易结构调整,推动国际经济体制和国际金融体系的改革。     

New Estimates of the United States–China BilateralTrade Balances

The United States and China have vastly different official estimates of the bilateral trade imbalance. The U.S. figures show that the United States had a merchandise trade deficit of US$68.7 billion vis-à-vis China in 1999 whereas the Chinese figures show that China had a merchandise trade surplus of only US$22.4 billion vis-à-vis the United States. There is a difference of US$46.3 billion. Which set of figures is right? It turns out that neither side is completely right. Various factors, such as f.o.b.–c.i.f. adjustments and treatments of re-exports and re-export markups, complicate the measurement of the bilateral trade balance between the United States and China. One important conclusion that emerges is that while U.S. trade statistics may be more reliable than Chinese trade statistics, even they are not completely accurate. By explicitly taking into account the aforementioned factors, the discrepancy between the adjusted U.S. and Chinese data on the bilateral trade balance in 1999 is narrowed from US$46.3 billion to US$4.8 billion, or approximately 10% of the initial figure. Our best estimate for the true U.S.–China bilateral merchandise trade balance for 1999 is US$47.8 billion, in China's favor. If we take into account the trade in services, in which the United States has traditionally enjoyed a surplus, the U.S.–China bilateral trade balance may be estimated at approximately US$45 billion in 1999. Compared with the U.S. trade deficit with Japan (over US$70 billion in 1999), the U.S.–China trade deficit, appropriately adjusted, is still significantly smaller. J. Japan. Int. Econ., March 2001, 15(1), pp. 102–130. Department of Economics, University of California, Santa Cruz, California 95064; and Department of Economics, Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305-6072. Copyright 2001 Academic Press.Journal of Economic Literature Classification Numbers: F10, F13.     

产业国际转移视角下的中美贸易摩擦

文章认为,中美贸易逆差近年来大幅增长,在很大程度上是由于发达国家国内产业结构调整,将大量劳动密集型产业和资本技术密集型产业中的劳密型环节转移到中国,实际上等于是把东亚周边国家和地区以前对美、欧的顺差转变成中国对美、欧的顺差,将它们过去与美国的贸易摩擦转换成为中美贸易摩擦。为理顺中美经贸关系,应加快外贸发展方式的转变,坚持合作共赢的原则,大力推进走出去的战略和实施出口多元化战略。     

全球价值链分工下中美双边贸易要素结构分析——对HOV定理的再检验

全球价值链分工下要素的跨境流动赋予了贸易要素含量新的内涵。本文提出了符合全球价值链分工特征的贸易要素含量测算框架,并以中美贸易为对象对Heckscher-Ohlin-Vanek（简称HOV）定理的有效性进行检验。结果表明,中美双边贸易的要素结构并不符合HOV定理的预期,中国对美国的资本净出口大于劳动净出口,且二者之间的差距在逐渐增大。美国跨国公司的FDI和中美两国劳动生产率差异导致的中国（美国）对美国（中国）出口资本/劳动比的提升（下降）是造成这一结果的主要原因。中美两国劳动要素结构体现出显著的互补性。优化要素结构,提升中高技术劳动对中国出口增加值的贡献度,是实现中国比较优势动态升级的基础。     

贸易失衡的根源:汇率还是经济结构——基于美国案例的实证分析

本文基于协整理论、Granger因果检验、脉冲响应函数等时间序列处理技术对美国经济结构、财政赤字、汇率与其贸易收支之间的动态关系进行了实证检验。检验结果表明:长期内,实体经济占比的增加会改善贸易收支,虚拟经济占比、财政赤字增加会恶化贸易收支,而汇率水平对于贸易收支的影响不显著;短期内,实体经济占比、虚拟经济占比对贸易收支的影响与长期相一致,财政赤字则相反,而汇率水平的上升在短期内导致贸易盈余的增加,但弹性值有变小的趋势。其政策的含义在于:影响美国贸易收支的主要因素来自其财政赤字及其国内经济结构,即实体经济与虚拟经济创造GDP的比例关系,而非汇率因素。因此,只有通过协调其国内实体经济与虚拟经济的发展,减少财政赤字,收缩储蓄-投资缺口才可以有效地调节贸易失衡问题,而不能一味地强调汇率因素。     

产业地理与贸易决策——理解中美贸易战的微观逻辑

2018年开始,美国对华发起规模空前的贸易战,具体内容主要包括“关税战”和“技术战”两个方面。贸易战在美国国内引发了明显的利益分化,利益受损方及其在政治体系中的代表力量成为特朗普政府与中国达成贸易协议以在某种程度上减弱贸易战烈度甚至结束贸易战的主要动力。由于美国的产业呈现高度的地理集聚特征,在中美贸易战中利益受到损失的产业最终会通过它们所在选区的政治代言人来表达自身的利益诉求,因此,理解美国产业地理政治的基本特征是理解中美贸易战进程中两国变换采取攻守策略的逻辑基础。作者认为,以产业集中分布为特征的产业地理和以选区为中心的政治地理是理解美国社会利益和政策偏好向联邦政府传导的两把“钥匙”,它们共同构成了塑造联邦政府对华贸易政策的微观利益基础和核心动力机制。由于受损者比获益者更有动力站出来表达利益诉求以影响政府决策,作者在实证部分集中关注美国对华货物出口行业的产业地理政治,分析中美贸易战中美国国内潜在的反对力量,进而为有针对性地制定对美反制措施提出政策建议。     

Economic relations between China and the U.S

ABSTRACT

First, we summarise the chronology of the China-U.S. trade war. We then show that the China-U.S. trade surplus, correctly measured, is not as large as it is made out to be, but is nevertheless still a large number. In terms of the total domestic value-added generated by the exports of goods to each other, the China-U.S. bilateral gap is even smaller. Next, we analyse both the immediate and real impacts of the mutual tariffs on the two economies. Third, we discuss economic and technological competition between China and the U.S. and present long-term projections of the two economies to 2050. Fourth, we identify the economic complementarities between China and the U.S. We then discuss the possibility of coordinated expansion of trade. Fifth, we also discuss the thorny bilateral issues in the economic relations between the two countries.