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Trade Liberalization (trade + liberalization)
Kinds of Trade Liberalization Selected AbstractsTRADE LIBERALIZATION AND COMPENSATION,INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC REVIEW, Issue 3 2006Carl Davidson Liberalization harms some groups while generating aggregate benefits. We consider various labor market policies that might be used to compensate those who lose from freer trade. Our goal is to find the policy that compensates each group of losers at the lowest cost to the economy. We argue that wage subsidies should be used to compensate those who bear the adjustment costs triggered by liberalization whereas employment subsidies should be used to compensate those who remain trapped in the previously protected sector. Our analysis indicates that the cost of compensation is low, provided that the right policy is used. [source] POLITICAL ECONOMY OF GOVERNMENT SPENDING FOR TRADE LIBERALIZATION: POLITICS OF AGRICULTURE RELATED GOVERNMENT SPENDING FOR THE URUGUAY ROUND IN JAPANTHE JAPANESE ECONOMIC REVIEW, Issue 2 2010KOZO HARIMAYA This paper investigates the effect of political factors on the interregional allocation of the budget to assist farmers in coping with agricultural trade liberalization in Japan. We present a simple model to show the relationship between political factors and interregional budget allocation and empirically examine whether political factors played a key role in the interregional allocation of Japanese government spending for the Uruguay Round agricultural trade liberalization. Our findings show that this allocation was distorted due to political reasons, which was problematic from the standpoints of fairness and social efficiency. [source] Trade Liberalization and the Fiscal Squeeze: Implications for Public InvestmentDEVELOPMENT AND CHANGE, Issue 3 2003Barsha Khattry This article examines the impact of trade liberalization on the level and structure of government expenditures across countries, with particular emphasis on low income countries. It develops the argument that the policies employed during trade liberalization have resulted in a fiscal squeeze as a result of declining tax revenues and rising interest expenditures. To surmount this fiscal hurdle, expenditures on physical capital, which have negligible political ramifications, have been reduced. Other more politically sensitive expenditures, such as spending on social capital, have been financed by incurring additional debt. However, additional debt has exerted upward pressure on interest payments, further exacerbating the fiscal situation. The statistical analysis carried out to examine the evidence uses panel data for eighty developing and industrialized countries over the period 1970,98 and employs a fixed,effects regression framework to account for country,specific characteristics. The results indicate that trade liberalization has indeed resulted in declining revenues and higher interest expenditures and that these factors have contributed to the observed decline in infrastructure spending. [source] Trade Liberalization and the Geography of Production: Agglomeration, Concentration, and Dispersal in Indonesia's Manufacturing IndustryECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY, Issue 3 2004Örjan Sjöberg Abstract: The effect of the liberalization of trade on the spatial concentration of economic activities is not straightforward. It has been widely argued that protectionism increases spatial concentration as firms locate close to the main domestic markets. However, it has also been argued that an expansion of international trade primarily favors existing industrial centers and therefore leads to increased regional inequalities. Against the background of ongoing debates in both mainstream economics and in geography, we examine the spatial concentration of manufacturing in Indonesia between 1980 and 1996, a period when Indonesia substantially liberalized its trade regime. The high concentration did not decrease during this period, and establishments that engaged in international trade were actually comparably concentrated. We discuss some possible explanations for the spatial concentration in Indonesia and conclude that a host of factors may affect the outcome of trade liberalizations. In particular, the spatial configuration of the national settlement system is a potentially important factor in this regard. [source] The Impact of Trade Liberalization on Regional Disparities in MexicoGROWTH AND CHANGE, Issue 1 2002Javier Sánchez-Reaza After a long period of industrialization based on import substitution (ISI), Mexico started to open up its economy by accessing the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) in 1986. The export-promotion strategy was transformed into one of regional integration with the signing of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) in 1994. The paper explores the impact of the opening of the economy on regional disparities in Mexico using , and ,-convergence analyses. Four different samples have been employed to control for possible data bias linked to the inclusion of oil-producing and maquiladora-based states. The results show that whereas the final stages of the ISI period were dominated by convergence trends, trade liberalization (GATT) and economic integration (NAFTA) have led to divergence. In particular, the NAFTA period is related to divergence regardless of the type of analysis chosen and the sample used. [source] Agricultural Trade Liberalization and the Least Developed CountriesJOURNAL OF AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS, Issue 2 2009Farhad Mirzaei First page of article [source] The Geographic Effects of Trade Liberalization with Increasing Returns in TransportationJOURNAL OF REGIONAL SCIENCE, Issue 2 2003Kashif S. Mansori The distinctive features of the model are that transportation is costly between locations within a nation as well as between nations, and that these transportation costs are subject to increasing returns to scale. A result of the model is that trade liberalization may cause the population of a country to become more concentrated in a single megalopolis. The large megalopolis may reduce welfare due to congestion costs, which implies that liberalization may unexpectedly leave the country worse off. [source] The Politics of Financial Development: Evidence from Trade LiberalizationTHE JOURNAL OF FINANCE, Issue 3 2008MATIAS BRAUN ABSTRACT Incumbents in various industries have different incentives to promote or oppose financial development. Changes in the relative strength of promoter and opponent industries thus result in changes in the political equilibrium level of financial development. We conduct an event study using a sample of 41 countries that liberalized trade during 1970 to 2000, and show that the strengthening of promoter relative to opponent industries resulting from liberalization is a good predictor of subsequent financial development. The benefits of developing the financial system are insufficient for financial development, and rents in particular hands appear to be necessary to achieve it. [source] Who is Better Off from Trade Liberalization?ASIAN ECONOMIC JOURNAL, Issue 3 2007An Experience from Urban China F16; O15; J31 Empirical studies have found that the skill wage gap (difference between wages earned by skilled and unskilled workers) narrowed in the case of the ,Four Asian Dragons' as they underwent trade liberalization during the 1960s and 1970s, whereas the gap widened in most of the Latin American countries after they liberalized their economies in the 1980s. China's integration into the world economy since 1978 has been used to explain this phenomenon, but few formal studies have been carried out in China regarding the effects of trade liberalization on the skill wage gap because of the limited availability of data. The present study uses unique household surveys conducted in ten provinces of China in 1988 and 1995 to study this issue. Results show that trade liberalization that occurred in China between 1988 and 1995 was responsible for an average increase of 28.73 yuan (approximately 20 percent of the total increase) in average monthly wages. However, trade liberalization significantly widened the urban skill wage gap in China by introducing an increase in income only for those who had 13 years or more of education (at least junior high school graduates). Interestingly, import liberalization also only benefited those who had more than 9 years of schooling; whereas export liberalization brought wage increases for people with 7,12 years of education. Finally, those with specific production skills from technical schools, rather than those with several years of general education, were mostly favored in the labor market in China between 1988 and 1995. [source] US,Mexico fresh vegetable trade: the effects of trade liberalization and economic growthAGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS, Issue 1 2001Jaime E. Málaga NAFTA; Vegetables; Trade liberalization; Mexico Abstract Studies of US-Mexico vegetable trade have generally emphasized the importance of US tariffs in determining the competitive advantage of US producers. Even so, research has identified at least four factors related primarily to the different levels of economic development in the US and Mexico that also have important effects on US-Mexico agricultural trade in general and fresh vegetable trade in particular. These include the differential growth rates of US and Mexican real wages, production technology (yields), and per capita income as well as cyclical movements in the real Mexican Peso/US Dollar exchange rate. This study examines the relative contribution of NAFTA and the development-related factors to likely future changes in US fresh vegetable imports from Mexico. The analysis employs an econometric simulation model of US and Mexican markets for five fresh vegetables (tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, bell peppers, and onions) accounting for 80% of US fresh vegetable imports. The results suggest that the 1994,1995 Peso devaluation rather than NAFTA was primarily responsible for the sharp increase in US imports of Mexican vegetables observed in the first years following the implementation of NAFTA. Over time, however, the results suggest that differences in the growth rates of US and Mexican production yields and, to a lesser extent, of US and Mexican real incomes and/or real wage rates could plausibly contribute more to the future growth of US tomato, squash, and onion imports from Mexico than the trade liberalizing effects of NAFTA. [source] Trade liberalization and productivity dynamics: evidence from CanadaCANADIAN JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS, Issue 2 2008Alla Lileeva Abstract., The paper investigates the productivity effects of the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement on Canadian manufacturing. It finds that Canadian tariff cuts increased exit rates among moderately productive non-exporting plants. This led to the reallocation of market share towards highly productive plants, which explains the aggregate productivity gains observed when Canadian tariffs were reduced. The U.S. tariff cuts led to the within-plant productivity gains in exporters and, especially, new entrants into the export market. Any lack of output responses and labour-shedding as a consequence of the FTA was experienced by non-exporting plants, while exporters captured the gains from the FTA. Ce mémoire enquête sur les effets de productivité de l'Accord de libre échange Canada-USA dans le secteur manufacturier canadien. Il appert que les réductions de tarifs douaniers canadiens ont accru les taux d'évacuation des installations modérément productives qui n'exportaient pas. Voilà qui a entraîné une réallocation des parts de marché vers les installations hautement productives, ce qui explique les gains de productivité observés quand les tarifs douaniers ont été réduits. Les réductions de tarifs américains ont entraîné des gains de productivité intra-installations dans les entreprises exportatrices, et ce particulièrement pour les entreprises nouvellement entrées dans le marché des exportations. Tout manque à s'ajuster à l'Accord par une recalibration de la production et par une réduction de la main d'oeuvre s'est concentré dans les installations qui n'exportaient pas, alors que les entreprises exportatrices ont capturé les gains de l'Accord. [source] International Trade Theory and Policy: What is Left of the Free Trade Paradigm?DEVELOPMENT AND CHANGE, Issue 6 2005Sunanda Sen Free trade doctrines have been questioned from the angle of their logical validity as well as relevance. Their replacement by New Trade Theories has been matched by important policy moves on strategic trade and industrial policy in advanced countries. These are defended by the advanced nations, both at inter-governmental levels and in multilateral institutions, largely in the interest of big capital in industry and finance. However, the theoretically discarded principles of free trade are still in use to push trade liberalization in developing countries. An uneven power relation between the rich and poor nations of the world has generated this asymmetric combination of policies in the world economy. Neglect of the macroeconomic issues relating to the national as well as the world economy has led these theories and the related policies to ignore the concerns for growth as well as development. [source] Trade Liberalization and the Fiscal Squeeze: Implications for Public InvestmentDEVELOPMENT AND CHANGE, Issue 3 2003Barsha Khattry This article examines the impact of trade liberalization on the level and structure of government expenditures across countries, with particular emphasis on low income countries. It develops the argument that the policies employed during trade liberalization have resulted in a fiscal squeeze as a result of declining tax revenues and rising interest expenditures. To surmount this fiscal hurdle, expenditures on physical capital, which have negligible political ramifications, have been reduced. Other more politically sensitive expenditures, such as spending on social capital, have been financed by incurring additional debt. However, additional debt has exerted upward pressure on interest payments, further exacerbating the fiscal situation. The statistical analysis carried out to examine the evidence uses panel data for eighty developing and industrialized countries over the period 1970,98 and employs a fixed,effects regression framework to account for country,specific characteristics. The results indicate that trade liberalization has indeed resulted in declining revenues and higher interest expenditures and that these factors have contributed to the observed decline in infrastructure spending. [source] Distributional effects of WTO agricultural reforms in rich and poor countriesECONOMIC POLICY, Issue 50 2007Thomas W. Hertel SUMMARY WTO agricultural reforms Rich countries' agricultural trade policies are the battleground on which the future of the WTO's troubled Doha Round will be determined. Subject to widespread criticism, they nonetheless appear to be almost immune to serious reform, and one of their most common defences is that they protect poor farmers. Our findings reject this claim. The analysis conducted here uses detailed data on farm incomes to show that major commodity programmes are highly regressive in the US, and that the only serious losses under trade reform are among large, wealthy farmers in a few heavily protected sub-sectors. In contrast, analysis using household data from 15 developing countries indicates that reforming rich countries' agricultural trade policies would lift large numbers of developing country farm households out of poverty. In the majority of cases these gains are not outweighed by the poverty-increasing effects of higher food prices among other households. Agricultural reforms that appear feasible, even under an ambitious Doha Round, achieve only a fraction of the benefits for developing countries that full liberalization promises, but protect the wealthiest US farms from most of the rigors of adjustment. Finally, the analysis conducted here indicates that maximal trade-led poverty reductions occur when developing countries participate more fully in agricultural trade liberalization. , Thomas W. Hertel, Roman Keeney, Maros Ivanic and L. Alan Winters [source] Four Simple Tests of Campaign Contributions and Trade Policy PreferencesECONOMICS & POLITICS, Issue 2 2004Eugene Beaulieu This paper uses campaign contribution data to examine trade policy preferences among political action committees. With perfect factor mobility, as the Heckscher,Ohlin (HO) model assumes, interest group trade positions should depend on their factor of production but not on their industry. We show, consistent with the 2 × 2 HO model, that capital groups consistently back representatives supporting trade liberalization while labor groups favor protectionists. Unlike previous work, we also measure the variation in trade policy preferences within capital and labor groups. We find evidence that the industry net export position significantly affects labor unions' trade policy preferences. Industry characteristics have no impact on capital group lobbying. The former result suggests that empirical analyses of labor PAC contributions that exclude industry characteristics may be misspecified. [source] International issues in the supply of tobacco: recent changes and implications for alcoholADDICTION, Issue 12s4 2000Frank J. Chaloupka This paper reviews international issues in the supply of tobacco and tobacco products, including trade liberalization and globalization. The paper begins with a brief discussion of the theoretical foundations for trade and trade restrictions. This is followed by a description of the treatment of tobacco and tobacco products in recent multi-lateral, regional and bilateral trade agreements, as well as a short discussion of the recent globalization of the tobacco industry. Included in this description is a review of the empirical evidence on the impact of trade liberalization on tobacco use. The implications of two recently proposed international agreements - the Multilateral Agreement on Investments and the Framework Convention for Tobacco Control - are then discussed. The paper concludes by summarizing the theoretical and empirical evidence that shows clearly that trade liberalization has significantly increased tobacco use, particularly in low and middle-income countries, and follows this with a discussion of the lessons learned from tobacco for controlling alcohol supply. [source] Reconfiguring ,post-socialist' regions: cross-border networks and regional competition in the Slovak and Ukrainian clothing industryGLOBAL NETWORKS, Issue 3 2008ADRIAN SMITH Abstract The global garment industry is currently being reshaped in dramatic ways through processes of trade liberalization, delocalization and interfirm and interregional competition. There has been much speculation about the increasing importance of factor (especially labour) costs in fuelling further rounds of de-localization of garment production towards low-cost production locations, such as China and India. However, the extent to which these processes mean the end to garment production in higher factor-cost locations, including those neighbouring the major clothing markets of the USA and the EU, is open to question. In this article we interrogate the interregional shifts in garment sourcing taking place in Europe and its surrounding regions. While factor costs (including labour) are important determinants of the geography of sourcing, a range of other costs (logistical and policy costs) are important in structuring the geographies of global and regional production. Firms in the Slovak Republic are responding to increasing competitive pressures and we assess how trans-border sourcing, subcontracting and FDI are being integrated into strategies to sustain European production networks. We highlight the emergence of cross-border production relocation to Ukraine as one specific strategy. We examine the product specificity of these changes and the ways in which they are embedded within already existing production networks, forms of cross-border contracting and central European trade regimes. In other words, we explore some of the forces that shape the somewhat tentative continuation of garment production for export to EU markets in central Europe despite the ,spectre of China'. [source] Globalization and supply chain networks: the auto industry in Brazil and IndiaGLOBAL NETWORKS, Issue 2 2003John Humphrey The automotive industries of emerging markets were transformed in the 1990s by trade liberalization and large investments by global assemblers. The impact of these investments was decisively influenced by government policies aimed at promoting local production and assembly of vehicles and by changing assembler,supplier relationships in the global auto industry. The cases of Brazil and India show how the assemblers created new linkages between operations in emerging markets and their global operations through the adoption of follow design and follow sourcing policies. These policies were hard to implement in practice, but they decisively transformed the components industries in both countries. [source] The Impact of Trade Liberalization on Regional Disparities in MexicoGROWTH AND CHANGE, Issue 1 2002Javier Sánchez-Reaza After a long period of industrialization based on import substitution (ISI), Mexico started to open up its economy by accessing the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) in 1986. The export-promotion strategy was transformed into one of regional integration with the signing of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) in 1994. The paper explores the impact of the opening of the economy on regional disparities in Mexico using , and ,-convergence analyses. Four different samples have been employed to control for possible data bias linked to the inclusion of oil-producing and maquiladora-based states. The results show that whereas the final stages of the ISI period were dominated by convergence trends, trade liberalization (GATT) and economic integration (NAFTA) have led to divergence. In particular, the NAFTA period is related to divergence regardless of the type of analysis chosen and the sample used. [source] PREFERENTIAL TRADE AGREEMENTS AND MULTILATERAL TARIFF COOPERATION*INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC REVIEW, Issue 1 2006Kamal SaggiArticle first published online: 23 JAN 200 Are preferential trade agreements (PTAs) building or stumbling blocks for multilateral trade liberalization? I address this question in an infinitely repeated tariff game between three countries engaged in intraindustry trade under oligopoly. The central result is that when countries are symmetric, a free trade agreement (FTA) undermines multilateral tariff cooperation by adversely affecting the cooperation incentive of the nonmember whereas a customs union (CU) does so via its effect on the cooperation incentives of members. However, when countries are asymmetric with respect to either market size or cost, there exist circumstances where PTAs facilitate multilateral tariff cooperation. [source] Exchange Rate Regimes and Reforms: A Panel Analysis for the World versus OECD Countries,INTERNATIONAL FINANCE, Issue 3 2006Ansgar Belke This paper examines the contemporaneous relationship between the exchange rate regime and structural economic reforms over a period of 30 years. Using panel data techniques, we look at both a broad ,world sample' and an OECD country sample. We investigate empirically whether structural reforms have complemented or substituted for monetary commitment in the attempt to improve macroeconomic performance. Our results suggest that, on average, an exchange rate rule positively correlates with the amount of overall structural reforms and of trade liberalization in particular. However, we do not find a significant and robust impact of exchange rate commitment on labour and product market reform. The results are similar for both the wider, more heterogeneous world sample and the panel of OECD economies. They contradict the hypothesis that exchange rate commitments may have slowed the pace of structural reform, but neither provides robust evidence that losing the possibility of an exchange rate adjustment promotes labour and product market reforms. [source] U.S. Foreign Economic Policy and the Significance of the National Economic CouncilINTERNATIONAL STUDIES PERSPECTIVES, Issue 2 2006CHRIS J. DOLAN Research demonstrates that the National Economic Council (NEC) and the decision-making process through which economic issues must pass are essential components in the evolution of American foreign economic policy. This article will examine the functions and responsibilities of the NEC in the making of U.S. foreign economic policy under Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. It selects key policies, namely international monetary policy, fiscal policy, and trade liberalization, and examines key issues within each in order to provide tentative answers to questions regarding foreign economic policy and the emergence and development of the NEC. Also, this article supplies an overview of the large body of research on international economics and foreign economic policy. Furthermore, it identifies key U.S. foreign economic policy issues developed and coordinated by the NEC. The article concludes with a discussion of to what extent the NEC is a significant development in U.S. foreign economic policy and in the making of foreign policy. [source] Are Free Trade Areas Good for Multilateralism?INTERNATIONAL STUDIES QUARTERLY, Issue 4 2002Evidence from the European Free Trade Association Do free trade agreements (FTAs) help or hinder multilateral trade liberalization? This question, though much debated, remains unanswered because (1) there has been scant attention to the conditions under which FTAs have either effect, and (2) extant hypotheses have not been rigorously tested. In this article I identify conditions under which FTAs help and hinder broader trade liberalization: they do the former when members' intra, and extra,FTA comparative advantages are similar and the latter when the opposite is true. I test these hypotheses using trade, output, and tariff data from the European Free Trade Association. The trade data indicate that members with similar intra, and extra,FTA comparative advantages liberalized trade more rapidly than those with dissimilar comparative advantages. The output and tariff data suggest that these differences among members reflect hypothesized economic and political processes. My research implies that scholars should abandon universalistic arguments concerning the effects of regional arrangements and devote more attention to the conditions governing the relationship between regionalism and multilateralism. [source] ENTREPRENEURS' LOCATION CHOICE AND PUBLIC POLICIES: A SURVEY OF THE NEW ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHYJOURNAL OF ECONOMIC SURVEYS, Issue 5 2008Fabien Candau Abstract The aim of this paper is to survey what has been done by the New Economic Geography (NEG) on a regional scale in order to answer the three following questions: What are the predictions of the NEG concerning the future of regions in the triad? Are these predictions robust? What can be the optimal public policy on a regional and national scale in a world characterized by agglomeration, trade liberalization and mobility of entrepreneurs? In surveying the most recent contributions in this area, the paper sheds light on several shortcomings of the NEG literature in order to point out new directions for further research, with particular reference to studies concerning welfare and tax competition. [source] US,Mexico fresh vegetable trade: the effects of trade liberalization and economic growthAGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS, Issue 1 2001Jaime E. Málaga NAFTA; Vegetables; Trade liberalization; Mexico Abstract Studies of US-Mexico vegetable trade have generally emphasized the importance of US tariffs in determining the competitive advantage of US producers. Even so, research has identified at least four factors related primarily to the different levels of economic development in the US and Mexico that also have important effects on US-Mexico agricultural trade in general and fresh vegetable trade in particular. These include the differential growth rates of US and Mexican real wages, production technology (yields), and per capita income as well as cyclical movements in the real Mexican Peso/US Dollar exchange rate. This study examines the relative contribution of NAFTA and the development-related factors to likely future changes in US fresh vegetable imports from Mexico. The analysis employs an econometric simulation model of US and Mexican markets for five fresh vegetables (tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, bell peppers, and onions) accounting for 80% of US fresh vegetable imports. The results suggest that the 1994,1995 Peso devaluation rather than NAFTA was primarily responsible for the sharp increase in US imports of Mexican vegetables observed in the first years following the implementation of NAFTA. Over time, however, the results suggest that differences in the growth rates of US and Mexican production yields and, to a lesser extent, of US and Mexican real incomes and/or real wage rates could plausibly contribute more to the future growth of US tomato, squash, and onion imports from Mexico than the trade liberalizing effects of NAFTA. [source] The impacts of trade liberalization on employment and wages in Tunisian industriesJOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT, Issue 4 2005Ilham Haouas This paper investigates short and long-run effects of trade liberalization on employment and wages. Employment and wage equations are estimated using data (1971,96) for importable and exportable industrial sectors in Tunisia. Causality tests show that causality is unidirectional. Wages strongly causes employment. There is significant difference in the direction of effects in the short and long-run. Empirical results only support the short-run theoretical predictions for the exportable sectors. A possible reason for the divergence of theory and practice is that the theoretical model is premised on the basis of a fixed supply of labour. Employment at exportable sectors could therefore only rise if employment at importable fell. However, as we have seen, the supply of labour increased dramatically in Tunisia as women entered the labour market. This allowed employment at importable sectors to be maintained as the exportable sector expanded. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] A firm level analysis of trade, technology and employment in South AfricaJOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT, Issue 1 2004Lawrence Edwards This paper uses two firm level surveys, the National Enterprise (NE) survey and the Greater Johannesburg Metropolitan Area (GJMA) survey, to explore the implications of globalization for employment in South Africa. These relationships are explored using cross-tabulations and estimated labour demand functions. The paper finds that rising import penetration negatively affected employment in large firms, but not small firms. Relatively large declines in employment also occurred within export firms, despite improvements in export competitiveness and export growth through trade liberalization. Finally, the study finds that skill-biased and trade-induced technological change, as reflected in increased use of computers, foreign investment and the importation of raw material inputs, have raised the skill intensity of production. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] The Geographic Effects of Trade Liberalization with Increasing Returns in TransportationJOURNAL OF REGIONAL SCIENCE, Issue 2 2003Kashif S. Mansori The distinctive features of the model are that transportation is costly between locations within a nation as well as between nations, and that these transportation costs are subject to increasing returns to scale. A result of the model is that trade liberalization may cause the population of a country to become more concentrated in a single megalopolis. The large megalopolis may reduce welfare due to congestion costs, which implies that liberalization may unexpectedly leave the country worse off. [source] The Determinants of Child Labour: The Role of Primary Product SpecializationLABOUR, Issue 2 2005Leonardo Becchetti The paper tests predictions of a traditional intra-household bargaining model which, under reasonable assumptions, shows that lack of bargaining power in the value chain significantly reduces the capacity for obtaining benefits from increased product demand arising from trade liberalization and therefore is positively associated with child labour. Cross-sectional and panel negative binomial estimates in a sample of emerging countries support this hypothesis. They show that proxies of domestic workers' bargaining power in the international division of labour (such as the share of primary product exports) are significantly related to child labour, net of the effect of traditional controls such as parental income, quality of education, international aid, and trade liberalization. The positive impact of the share of primary product exports on child labour outlines a potential paradox. The paradox suggests that trade liberalization does not always have straightforward positive effects on social indicators and that its short-run effects on income distribution and distribution of skills and market power across countries need to be carefully evaluated. [source] The Judicial Transformation of the State: The Case of U.S. Trade Policy, 1974,2004LAW & POLICY, Issue 1 2009NITSAN CHOREV The recent shift in state policies from Keynesianism to neoliberalism was accompanied by a transformation in state structures. The case of trade liberalization in the United States reveals that this structural transformation is of a judicial nature. In 1974, supporters of free trade successfully shifted authority over the management of protectionist claims from Congress to quasi-judicial bodies in the U.S. executive; in 1994, they successfully strengthened the dispute settlement mechanisms of the World Trade Organization. This judicial transformation indicates a shift from sites where decisions are made by way of political negotiations to sites where judges preside over legal disputes. In the article, I identify the political origins of these judicial transformations and discuss the factors that make judicial sites more favorable to neoliberal policies than political sites. [source] | ||||||||||||||||