Urban unemployment and optimal trade policy in a cash-in-advance economy

This paper examines the welfare effects of commercial and tax/subsidy policies on a developing economy with sectoral unemployment and differential cash-in-advance constraints. The optimal tariff can be negative when the cash-in-advance requirement for buying the importable good is larger than that for the exportable good. In addition, when capital is sectorally mobile, production taxes are superior to production subsidies to the importable sector. Nevertheless, to reach the first-best optimum, a uniform wage subsidy to both sectors is required.