Trade Specialization in Latin America: The Impact of China and India

This paper examines the extent to which the growth of China and India in world markets is affecting the patterns of trade specialization in Latin American (LA) economies. We construct a measure of Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA) by 3-digit ISIC sector, country, and year. This RCA accounts for both imports and exports. The empirical analyses explore the correlation between the RCAs of LA and the two Asian economies. Econometric estimates suggest that the specialization pattern of LA—with the exception of Mexico—has been moving in opposite direction to the trade specialization pattern of China and India. Labor-intensive sectors (both unskilled and skilled) probably have been negatively affected by the growing presence of China and India in world markets, while natural resource and scientific knowledge intensive sectors have probably benefited from China and India’s growth since 1990. JEL no.  F10, F14     

全球化的测度与比较

本文通过构造全球化指数,测度全球122个国家或地区1998至2004年的相对全球化水平,并以此对各经济体全球化水平进行排序和分析。除亚洲的新加坡和中国香港外,全球化程度高的经济体基本上为欧洲和北美等发达国家。发展中国家的全球化发展水平大大低于发达国家。     

State-Building in Resource-Rich Economies

One of the most significant differences between developing countries and today’s advanced states is the fact that many developing countries rely heavily on one or several natural resources. That such dependence shapes the state’s ability to tax—its fiscal capacity—is commonly argued in the political science and applied development literatures. This paper approaches the issue from an economic angle. Our analytical foundation builds upon a novel theoretical framework, and allows us to model fiscal capacity as an ex ante investment under uncertainty. For our panel of 30 hydrocarbon-rich economies, instrumental-variables results provide strong empirical support for our theoretical proposition: resource intensification weakens state-building by impeding the state’s fiscal capacity. This result provides an inaugural validation of the economic analytics of state-capacity determinants: understanding these determinants serves to build stronger states and support sustainable paths of development. Our result also suggests that one of the main tools of fiscal policy-analysis in resource-rich economies, namely optimal taxation, could gain in practical relevance by incorporating capacity-constraints into the analytical fiscal-framework.     

Destructive Trade and Its Effects on the Global Economy

This lecture was offered in honor of Professor Robert Mundell; a most fitting coincidence since the speaker was his classmate at MIT in 1955, exactly 55 years ago, and the topic emanated from our joint study with Professors Kindleberger and Samuelson at that time. The essence of the presentation can be summarized in its significant conclusions. The theory of comparative advantage as applied to real-world phenomena—and its practical free-trade recommendations—must be rejected or at least questioned, especially when it comes to trade between the advanced and the developing economies. The more realistic, even if less elegant mathematically, theory of Destructive Trade—explained in the lecture—should be a better guide in defining world trade solutions and leading us in the long run out of the present global crisis.     

Antidumping and foreign divestment: Japanese electronics multinationals in the EU

This paper explores the relationship between the closure of “antidumping jumping” manufacturing plants and the repeal of antidumping measures. Of 67 identified Japanese “antidumping jumping” production lines in the EU in 1990 only 31 remained in operation in 1999. Analysis of the probability of divestment for 209 Japanese plants in the broadly defined electronics industry shows that Japanese plants of manufacturing products for which antidumping duties had been repealed are significantly and substantially more likely to be divested. The results suggest that the potential positive effects of antidumping duties on host economies by inducing inward investment are in many cases short-lived and easily overestimated. JEL no. F23, F13, L11     

Recent U.S. economic policies and the Central Caribbean economies

This study examines the trade and investment performances of three economies in the Central Caribbean region since the Caribbean Basin Initiative (CBI) and associated programs. We find that the rapid growth in nontraditional exports from these economies to the United States did not necessarily translate into net foreign exchange earnings. On a per capita basis, export-related investment in Haiti was much lower than in the other two economies — Jamaica and the Dominican Republic. As a percentage of the labor force, gross employment gains for Jamaica have been significantly larger than those in either the Dominican Republic or Haiti. It appears that the policies favoring expansion in the offshore sector may foster employment opportunities of females, especially where traditional sectors are in decline.     

U.S. Antidumping Enforcement and Macroeconomic Indicators Revisited: Do Petitioners Learn?

We contribute to the literature on the political economy of U.S. antidumping enforcement through an analysis of the pattern—and macroeconomic determinants—of country-specific antidumping petitions filed by U.S. firms against 15 countries between 1981 and 1998 (examining quarterly data). We reconcile some seemingly inconsistent results from the prior literature by suggesting that “learning” by petitioners about the administration—in practice—of the U.S. trade laws has led to changes in the roles of the macroeconomic determinants over time. JEL no. F13     

Measuring Restrictiveness of Bilateral Trade Policies: A Comparison between Developed and Developing Countries

This paper compares the degree of openness to trade of three developed countries markets—the European Union, Japan, the United States—with that of three middle-income countries, namely Brazil, India, and China. A theoretically consistent protection measure—the Mercantilistic Trade Restrictiveness Index (MTRI)—is employed to average tariffs at different levels of aggregation. The computation relies on a comparative static applied general equilibrium model (Global Trade Analysis Project—GTAP) featuring imperfect competition as well as on the bilateral applied tariffs included in the most recent version of the GTAP database. Results provide a different picture from what could have been expected given the widely publicized diffusion of preferential schemes supposedly favoring developing countries exports. JEL no.  F17, C68, Q17     

Doomed to Deficits? Aggregate U.S. Trade Flows Re-Examined

This paper examines the stability of import and export demand functions for the United States over the 1975q1–2001q2 period. Using the Johansen maximum likelihood approach, an export demand function is readily identified. In contrast, there appears to be a structural break in the import demand function in 1995; specifications incorporating this break pass tests for cointegration, although the price elasticity is not statistically significant. Only when excluding computers and parts from the import series is a stable import demand function detected. The resulting point estimates confirm the persistence of the income asymmetry first noted by Houthakker and Magee, although in a slightly diminished form. One policy implication of these findings is that dollar depreciation—unaccompanied by a realignment of growth trends—is insufficient to substantially reduce the U.S. trade deficit. JEL no. F31, F41     

Wage and employment effects in the EU of international trade with the emerging economies

The paper investigates whether significant HOS effects are present in the EU from trade liberalization with the emerging economies. Regarding wage inequality, there is only evidence of a trade-induced technological change, but biased towards thelower-skilled-labor-intensive sectors. Relative wages in the EU member states are not affected differently. Trade liberalization under ‘European assumptions’, however, could affect primarily relative factor demand. A flexible cost function approach shows that import competition from the emerging economies influenced relative labor demand in favor of the higher skilled, implying an intrasectoral rather than an intersectoral specialization in skill-intensive activities. JEL no. F11, F14     

Does Gravity Matter in a Service Economy?

This paper estimates gravity equations for bilateral services trade in a sample of 28 countries. It finds that the standard gravity variables of economic size and geographic proximity are significant factors in services trade. It also reveals positive effects of linguistic ties on services trade. There is evidence of a positive link between regional trade arrangements and services trade. Much of that effect appears to reflect the impact of bilateral goods trade on services trade. This implies that efforts to enhance goods trade—bilateral or multilateral—should lead to more services trade as well. JEL no. F13, F15, L80     

The Dynamics of International Trade Patterns

This paper introduces new dynamic measures for examining changes in international trade patterns. Using data for 20 OECD countries over the 1980–2000 period, we show that inter-industry trade changes contrary to countries’ previous specialization are frequently the dominant form of trade expansion. The econometric analysis indicates that the observed changes in trade patterns were explained by initial endowments of human-capital and industry-specific changes in labour productivity and labour costs. The results also suggest that trade liberalization induced an increase in the previous specialization of larger OECD economies in industries with increasing returns to scale. JEL no. F1, O33, O50     

Exchange Rate Regimes and Reserve Policy: The Italian Lira, 1883–1911

The three exchange rate regimes adopted by Italy from 1883 up to the eve of World War I — the gold standard (1883–1893), floating rates (1894–1902), and “gold shadowing” (1903–1911)—produced a puzzling result: formal adherence to the gold standard ended in failure while shadowing the gold standard proved very successful. This paper discusses the main policies underlying Italy’s performance particularly focusing on the strategy of reserve accumulation. It presents a cointegration analysis identifying a distinct co-movement between exchange rate, reserves, and banknotes that holds over the three sub-periods of the sample. Given this long-run relationship, the different performance in each regime is explained by the diversity of policy measures, reflected in the different variables adjusting the system in the various regimes. Italy’s variegated experience during the gold standard provides a valuable lesson about current developments in the international scenario, showing the central role of fundamentals and consistent policies.     

Controlling inflation in transition economies: The relevance of central bank independence and the right nominal anchor

Controlling inflation is a central problem in transition economies. This paper asks under what conditions or even whether central bank independence helps in this task. The conclusion shows that merely imposing legal independence on the central bank may be ineffective or even counterproductive. It is necessary to make a monetary strategy and the responsibilities and restrictions of central bank policy transparent to the public. In addition, it is important that the right nominal anchor is selected—one that is, or is believed to be, effective and sustainable. Both monetary targeting and inflation targeting are assumed to be unsuitable for most transition countries. Instead, some kind of dynamic exchange rate targeting appears to be the most reasonable choice.     

Currency unions and trade: The special case of EMU

In this paper, the impact of the adoption of the euro on the commercial transactions of EMU countries is investigated. It seeks to disentangle the effects of eliminating exchange rate volatility — and those of other policy factors that promote integration — from the influence of the emergence of the European currency union. Since EMU is a relatively new phenomenon, a panel estimation of the gravity equation in a dynamic framework is used in order to capture effects like trade persistence. The main finding is that the adoption of the euro has had a positive but not an exorbitant impact on bilateral trade between European countries (ranging between 9 and 10 per cent). The impact is much lower than that shown in the recent literature on a larger and heterogeneous set of countries. One reason for this divergence seems to be that the euro was adopted after decades of integration policies had already worked through in Europe. JEL no. F4, F15, C230     

Some Further Evidence on Exchange-Rate Volatility and Exports

The relationship between exchange-rate volatility and aggregate export volumes is examined using a model that includes real export earnings of oil-exporting economies as a determinant of export volumes of a sample of 12 industrial countries. Four fixed-coefficient panel-data estimation techniques, including a generalized method of moments (GMM) and random coefficient (RC) estimation, are employed on panel data covering the estimation period 1977:1–2003:4 using three measures of exchange-rate volatility. Our aim is to provide a theoretically and empirically justifiable specification that can guide researchers. In contrast to recent studies employing panel data, we find little evidence that volatility has a negative and significant impact on trade. We use second-generation RC estimation, which corrects for biases arising from incorrect functional forms, omitted variables, and measurement errors. Our results suggest that the finding of a significant and negative impact of volatility is attributable to specification biases. JEL no. C23, F3, F31     

Binding Overhang and Tariff-Cutting Formulas

Trade negotiations deal with cuts in bound duties, which differ substantially from applied preferential duties, and from MFN applied duties. Based on WTO’s Consolidated Tariff Schedules (CTS) database and on national sources, this paper proposes a systematic assessment of ad valorem-equivalent bound duties at the detailed product level, for almost all WTO members. Fully consistent with the assessment of applied protection provided in the MAcMap-HS6 database, this work allows the full structure of protection—bound, MFN applied, preferential applied duties—to be accurately assessed. We thus provide the first worldwide assessment of the binding overhang, i.e. the gap between bound and applied MFN tariffs. We also assess the likely applied-protection impact of an agreement in the Doha Round. JEL no. F13     

On the Impact of Foreign Aid in Education on Growth: How Relevant Is the Heterogeneity of Aid Flows and the Heterogeneity of Aid Recipients?

This paper examines whether foreign aid in education has a significant effect on growth. We take into consideration the heterogeneous nature of aid as well as the heterogeneity of aid recipients—we disaggregate the aid data into primary, secondary, and higher education, and run separate regressions for low income and middle income countries. We find that the effect of aid varies by income as well as by the type of aid. Thus our results underscore the importance of the heterogeneity of aid flows as well as the heterogeneity of recipient countries when analyzing the effect of aid on growth. JEL no. F34, F35, I20, O19     

Measuring the dynamics of APEC output connectedness

We examine the dynamics of output connectedness of Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) economies using time‐varying, region‐specific, generalised connectedness measures. We find that the connectedness of APEC economies with the rest of the world is quite substantial, with the 2008–09 Global Financial Crisis increasing the connectedness measures above their precrisis levels. The USA, China, and Korea are shown to be systemically important and to dominate APEC’s real activities, while outside the APEC region the roles of India and the UK are also non‐negligible. These results suggest that the majority of APEC economies are considerably open to output shocks from the dominant economies such that policymakers in APEC must be continuously conscious of headwinds originating from these sources.     

Harmonization of domestic and world prices for raw-material products in Russia’s strategy of economic development

This article discusses how in the modern Russian economy domestic and export prices for basic resources—oil, gas, oil products, metals, timber, chemicals, and grain—should be related. The correlation between the level of domestic prices for raw materials and industrialization processes is shown. The need for a coherent industrial policy aimed at a more rapid development of the processing and manufacturing industries is underlined. The conclusion is that the various measures of indirect regulation of domestic prices for basic resources are a natural constituent of a reasonable economic development strategy for Russia. Some possible actions to curb the growth in domestic prices for raw materials and primary products are considered.