Based on an empirical gravity model of sectoral bilateral trade, we uncover three features of bilateral trade balances. First, the difficulty of gravity models in fitting the observed level of bilateral balances is likely due to the presence of unobservable bilateral trade costs. Second, the...

China''s sectoral trade composition, product quality mix, and import content of processing exports have all changed substantially during the past decade. This has rendered trade elasticities estimated using aggregate data highly unstable, with more recent data pointing to significantly higher...

A reduced-form model approach was used to estimate the trade balance response to permanent domestic currency depreciation. For this purpose, long-run and short-run effects were estimated, using three modeling methods along with two real effective exchange rate measures. On average, a 1 percent...

This paper uses a Ricardian framework to clarify the role of microeconomic and macroeconomic factors governing the time series and cross-section behavior of sectoral trade balances. Unit labor costs and trade balances are calculated for several sectors for the seven major industrial countries....

It has recently been suggested that allowing for switches between different inflationary regimes produces a much better fit for the Fisher relationship between interest rates and inflation, at least for U.S. data. The paper assesses the merits of the regime-switching theory as an explanation for...

This paper outlines an approach to assess uncertainty around a forecast baseline as well as the impact of alternative policy rules on macro variability. The approach allows for non-Gaussian shock distributions and non-linear underlying macroeconomic models. Consequently, the resulting...