This paper analyses the effects of tariff reforms on welfare and market access in a competitive small open economy that is characterised by involuntary unemployment due to non-market clearing wages that are fixed either in terms of the numeraire or in real terms. We show that recent...

Are multinational enterprises, MNEs, more likely than non-MNEs to close down their plants due to their footloose character? The results from using a panel of all Swedish manufacturing plants over the period 1993 and 2002 suggest that MNE plants, in particular Swedish MNE plants, have a higher...

The effects of the liberalization of international trade are analyzed in a New Economic Geography model of a country with an asymmetric distribution of housing between regions. Labour is mobile between regions but not between countries. Trade liberalization tends to reduce inequalities in the...

With the signature of the Asuncion Treaty by Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay in July 1991, the four countries implemented an ambitious program to reduce tariffs and non-tariff barriers on their reciprocal trade; a common policy toward third countries was implemented in 1995. As MERCOSUR...

This paper explores a newly-available panel data set merging balance sheet and international trade transaction data for Belgium. Both imports and exports appear to be highly concentrated among few firms and seem to have become more so over time. Focusing on manufacturing, we find that facts...

This paper uses annual aggregate data for 36 low or middle income countries covering the period 1995-2001 to test the responsiveness of investment to the sources of finance under (un)favourable regimes for investment. Two sources of private investment finance are considered: private investment...

We study how competitive pressure influences the make-or-buy decision that oligopolistic firms face between producing an intermediate component in-house or purchasing it from a domestic supplier. We model outsourcing as a bilateral relationship in which the supplier undertakes...

This paper extends the literature on productivity spillovers from inward FDI. We use comparable industry level data for 17 OECD countries and investigate the importance of horizontal and vertical spillovers, and differences between CEEC and other OECD countries. Results show that there is...

In an international oligopoly model, we investigate how trade liberalisation impacts on collective bargaining outcomes when workers are represented by open shop unions. We find that, with intermediate levels of union density, trade liberalisation may lead to higher negotiated wages even if no...

This paper provides firm-level evidence on the way in which credit constraints affect FDI spillovers. Using a panel of approximately 20,000 Chinese manufacturing firms over the period 2001-2005, we show that credit constrained domestic firms have lower (even negative) FDI spillovers, with their...