The majority of independent nations today were part of empires in 1945. Using bilateral trade data from 1948 to 2006, we examine the effect of independence on post-colonial trade. On average, there is little short run effect of trade with the colonizer (metropole). However, after three decades...

This paper provides evidence on the long-term impact of market potential on economic development. It derives from the New Economic Geography literature a structural estimation where the level of factors' income of a country is related to its export capacity, labelled Market Access (MA) by...

This paper develops a method to measure difficulties in market access over a large set of industries and countries (both developing and developed), during the period 1980–2006. We use a micro-founded heterogeneous-consumers model to estimate the impact of national borders on global and...

This paper develops a method to measure difficulties in market access over a large set of industries and countries (both developing and developed), during the period 1980-2006. We use a micro-founded heterogeneous-consumers model to estimate the impact of national borders on global and regional...