Estimating the effect of trade on capital flows is difficult given the inherent identification problem. We use fluctuations in rainfall to capture the exogenous variation in trade between Germany, France, the U.K., and the Ottoman Empire during 1859-1913. The provisionistic policy of the Ottoman...

This paper investigates the effects of ethnic violence on export-oriented firms and their workers. Following the disputed 2007 Kenyan presidential election, export volumes of flower firms affected by the ensuing violence dropped by 38 percent and worker absence exceeded 50 percent. Large firms...

This study is the first attempt to investigate the patterns of imports and exports between the Russian Federation and East Asian economies, namely, the People's Republic of China; Hong Kong, China; Macau, China; Japan; the Republic of Korea; and Mongolia. To this end, a panel-gravity trade model with...

We conduct a randomized control trial that generates exogenous variation in the access to foreign markets for rug producers in Egypt. Combined with detailed survey data, we causally identify the impact of exporting on firm performance. Treatment firms report 15-25 percent higher profits and...

Free trade agreements (FTAs) have become a prominent feature of the multilateral trading system and an important instrument of trade policy for members of the World Trade Organization (WTO). The proliferation of FTAs is the result of a number of factors, from the economic to the political. East...

This paper explores the spillover effects of Japan's quantitative and qualitative easing (QQE) on East Asian economies. Under the new monetary policy regime, the Japanese yen depreciated substantially, raising concerns that it would have a regional beggar-thy-neighbor effect. It is thus...

When trade costs are of the iceberg type (Samuelson 1952) and markups are independent of trade costs, relative prices across markets are distorted, but relative prices within markets are not. When trade costs depart from the analytically convenient iceberg type, distortion will also occur within...

ABSTRACT: While it is a stylized fact that exporting firms pay higher wages than non-exporting firms, the direction of the link between exporting and wages is less clear. Using a rich set of German linked employer-employee panel data we follow over time plants that start to export. We show that...

This paper shows that uncertainty can lead firms to follow a gradual internationalization process. We describe a model in which firms are uncertain about their ability to earn profits in a foreign market and must decide whether or not to serve it, and whether to do so through exports or foreign...

We work with a panel of bilateral trade flows from 1988 to 2002, exploring the influence of infrastructure, institutional quality, colonial and geographic context, and trade preferences on the pattern of bilateral trade. We are interested in threshold effects, and so emphasize those cases where...