TRADE ADJUSTMENT ASSISTANCE AND IMPORT COMPETITION: Experience in the U.S. Footwear Industry: 1980-1997

This article analyzes the Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) program within NAFTA, the U.S.-Israel Free Trade Agreement (FTA), U.S.-Canada-FTA, and the Orderly Market Agreement (OMA) for the footwear industry. It evaluates costs and benefits as well as factors affecting TAA's certification and denial processes following trade liberalization. A three-stage least-squares (3TLS) model correlates the a priori specifications we developed from the literature and evaluates TAA's enhancement of net consumer surplus. The benefits have significant, independent effects on four census regions of the United States engaged in footwear production. A simulation of the results indicates some robustness in the estimates and supports the Department of Labor (DOL) rule-of-thumb statements of job gains due to trade liberalization. The results are supportive of the bipartisan NAFTA agreement. Due to TAA's benefits to displaced workers, positive net benefits have been substantial from the inception of NAFTA, in 1994, to 1997.     

The Walters-Lawson Affair and the Two Worlds of Communication

A bstract . The editor of The American Economist reflects on the difference between the nature of the communication carried on within scholarly journals and that which is carried on in the mass media. The occasion for the discussion was provided by the resignations from the British cabinet and from an inner circle of advisors, respectively of Nagl Lawson and Sir Alan Walters. This serious result followed the publication in the mass media of information intended for the scholarly journal.     

Spectral analysis of secondary market mexican external debt prices

The secondary market for developing country debt currently is one of the fastest growing segments of the fixed income securities market. This paper examines the spectral properties of secondary market Mexican external debt price variations from January 1986–December 1992. The analysis presented in this paper suggests that the secondary market for Mexican external debt may be characterized by the "random-walk with drift" model. Moreover, large (small) spectral density estimates at high (low) periodicities suggest that secondary market price variations were positively autocorrelated and aperiodic in nature, although there is some evidence to suggest the possible presence of short-period harmonic resonances. Cross-spectral analysis of the relationship between the 10-year U.S. Treasury bond interest rate and secondary market Mexican external debt prices appears to verify the theoretical relationship between market determined interest rates for default-free, dollar denominated debt and secondary market debt prices. More importantly, estimated phase-lag relationships suggest that the secondary market for Mexican external debt probably was inefficient at the semi-strong level.