This paper analyses the potentially defensive behaviour of successful innovators and its effect on aggregate R&D effort. It proposes a quality-ladders model that endogenously determines leader's technology advantages and who innovate (the leader firm or its competitors). Regulation can have...

This paper develops an intra-industry model of trade with heterogeneous firms to investigate the impact of trade on the evolution of within firm productivity. The main contribution is to incorporate endogenous labor productivity gains. Heterogeneous firms have different incentives to invest in...

We study the impact of trade on productivity using Chilean plant-level data (1982-1999). Our contribution is to disentangle the impact of export and import barriers. Firstly, we estimate the production functions to obtain plant TFP. Secondly, we estimate trade barriers (border effects) between...

Using bilateral trade flow data from 1979 to 1999, we estimate trade integration between Chile and its principal trading partners during the period (European Union, United States and Latin America). Our estimates are based on a gravity specification, theoretically grounded on a monopolistic...