Trade liberalization and wage inequality: Evidence from Korea

This paper investigates the heterogeneous income distribution effects of trade liberalization using Korean survey data from years of 2000–2015. Following the Stolper-Samuelson theorem most of previous research studying the effects of trade liberalization on wage differences focus on workers’ characteristics (e.g., skilled or unskilled) while heterogeneity within the same worker group has not been yet substantially investigated. To fill this gap, this paper provides empirical evidence of wage inequality across firms within the same group of workers caused by trade liberalization, potentially implied in the new-new trade models with firm heterogeneity. Employing a difference-in-differences (DID) specification, we find that the wages of unskilled workers in Korea have increased since its FTAs with more advanced countries, such as members of EU and the US, came into effect, while the effects on the wages of skilled workers are negative but not statistically significant. We also show that wage effects are heterogeneous across firms within unskilled and skilled worker groups, while the positive effects are statistically significant and largest for unskilled workers in medium-large sized firms. These findings are in line with both traditional and new-new trade models.     

Why will Trump lose the trade war?

ABSTRACT

The escalating U.S.–China trade conflicts have increasingly shadowed the outlook of the world economy. The Trump administration aims to achieve its strategic goals including reducing current account deficits, promoting the U.S. manufacturing sector, and curbing Chinese high-tech industries by waging the trade war against China. This paper argues that the current account deficits and the declining manufacturing sector in the U.S. are mainly driven by its internal structural factors, such as low saving rates, high labor costs, and rising service sector, rather than by the import competition from China. Moreover, the trade war further deteriorates the U.S. current account deficits and erode its comparative advantage, and it forces China to invest more in technological innovation and human capital, and thus promote its progress in high-tech industries. Thus, the U.S. will not be able to achieve its strategical goals and eventually lose the trade war.     

Overcoming the “Solow paradox”: Tariff reduction and productivity growth of Chinese ICT firms

This paper examines the phenomenon of the “Solow paradox” in China using the Annual Survey of Industrial Production database and the China Customs Records dataset from 1998 to 2007. We find that China likely fell into the Solow paradox in the period 1998–2002, but the total factor productivity of information and communication technology (ICT) enterprises has achieved rapid growth since 2003. Accession to the World Trade Organization is the key reason for China to overcome the Solow paradox, that is, input tariff reduction significantly promoted the productivity of ICT firms. A series of validity and robustness checks confirmed the results. Mechanism analysis shows that input liberalization promotes the productivity of ICT firms through optimizing factor structure, importing more and high-quality inputs, and increasing research and development investment. The conclusions provide strong empirical evidence for developing countries to overcome the Solow paradox through trade liberalization.     

Resistance to Trade Liberalization in Unionized Sector

This paper studies the lobbying against trade liberalization by both a firm and a union in the same industry. We find that the relationship between their political activities depends on the effect of political activity by one on the marginal effectiveness of political activity by the other. We also show that, when they are strongly risk-averse and their political activities are strategic complements, trade liberalization is likely to be successful if business is brisk, the foreign firm's production cost is high or the number of union members is small. However, when they are not strongly risk-averse, these results hold reversely.     

Inflation dynamics in Kazakhstan1

In January 1992, Kazakhstan initiated a reform programme to move towards market-determined prices. The price liberalization process was characterized by large relative price shifts and an increase in the overall price level towards those observed in market economies. The paper shows how the piecemeal manner in which prices were liberalized resulted in strong relative price variability over a prolonged period of time, against a background of high inflation. Convergence towards international relative and absolute price levels has progressed but is not complete, with prices for energy and services in particular still below market economy levels.     

Environmental standards as barriers to trade

This paper examines the case of a good, polluting in consumption, whose pollutive content is restricted by a government with strong environmental policies. When foreign producers are unable to comply with the restrictive environmental standard of such a country, to which they wish to export, they often allege that those standards constitute illegal barriers to free trade. An example of such a good is gasoline, excessively pollutive formulations of which are prohibited from importation into the United States by the 1970 Clean Air Act. Rather than banning them, such imports should be taxed, along with the domestically produced substitute good, according to their respective pollutant contents. This would foster economic efficiency and should be more acceptable to foreign producers than the outright prohibition mandated by the Clean Air Act. The results of this paper reaffirm the argument in a previous article in this journal (Socio-Economic Planning Sciences 29 (1995) 187), though the countries’ roles in the two papers are reversed, that free trade and Pigouvian environmental policies increase international welfare.     

关税升级与中国汽车产业发展——基于空间经济学的经验研究

本文利用中国与主要汽车生产国的汽车产业有关数据，在一个关税升级体系下垄断竞争产业发展模型的基础上，运用校准法进行了初步的经验研究。与以往汽车产业贸易政策基于寡占市场结构的经验研究不同，本文试图在垄断竞争市场结构下考察关税升级对中国汽车产业发展趋势的影响。研究表明，集合主要汽车生产国的数据后，汽车产业具有集聚发展的倾向，而我国目前较高程度的关税升级体系在其他条件不变的情况下，能够降低汽车产业实现大发展的临界条件。     

20世纪90年代以来印度资本账户开放的经验与启示

资本账户开放是印度一揽子经济改革开放的重要组成部分,印度政府对资本账户开放采取了灵活而实用的态度.从直接投资、证券投资、商业性外部借款和非居民印度人计划4个方面介绍了20世纪90年代以来印度资本账户开放的主要内容,分析了银行改革、汇率制度与资本账户开放的关联性.印度和中国的资本账户开放进程拥有许多相似之处,也存在值得中国借鉴的经验和启示.     

APEC贸易自由化效果的实证分析

1994年，亚太经济合作组织（以下简称APEC）确立了发达国家于2010年，发展中国家于2020年实现贸易和投资自由化的目标。贸易自由化目标的实现必将对亚太，乃至整个世界产生重要影响。利用可计算一般均衡模型（CGE）对APEC贸易自由化效果进行了模拟分析，结论是几乎所有APEC成员都能从中获益。根据模拟结果，中国作为其中一员，成为从贸易自由化的实现中获益较多的国家。     

入世后中国汽车工业安全度的DEA模型估算

汽车工业长期以来是我国重点实行保护政策的产业,因而也是入世后受冲击最大的产业之一。但是这种冲击到底有多大,以及在入世后的各个年份中,这种冲击又是如何分布的?尽管有不少学者已做了一些定性分析,但是定量估算的研究则少之又少。本文首先对入世后的汽车工业发展环境进行了分析,然后对入世后汽车工业发展的关键指标数据进行了预测,最后应用DEA模型对入世后汽车工业安全度进行了估算,得出了有说服力的估算结果。