Services trade continues to be the most dynamic part of world trade, and service sectors have long been the largest destination of foreign direct investment flows. Countries can reap huge potential gains through greater liberalization of services trade and investment, including increased job...

In 2005, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi pushed his landmark bill through the Japanese Diet, aimed at reforming Japan Post, the giant state-owned enterprise that provides postal services and houses two huge financial arms, Japan Post Bank and Japan Post Insurance. The bill envisaged substantial...

For more than 50 years the United States has attempted to destabilize and isolate the Castro regime in Cuba with the use of trade and financial sanctions, a policy that has fallen short of its objective. In this Policy Analysis, Gary Clyde Hufbauer and Barbara Kotschwar suggest that the sands of...

Prohibitions or restrictions on US exports of liquefied natural gas (LNG) are a bad idea. LNG exports will deliver economic benefits to the US economy. The US Department of Energy should approve pending LNG export applications for projects at an advanced planning stage, in conjunction with...

The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is a big deal in the making. With the Doha Round of multilateral trade negotiations at an impasse, the TPP negotiations have taken center stage as the most significant trade initiative of the 21st century. As of December 2012, negotiators have made extensive...

Trade and investment in services are difficult to measure, and the regulatory barriers that inhibit the free flow of services are hard to quantify. As a result, very little attention has been paid to dismantling barriers to services trade and investment in free trade negotiations. This paper...

The terrain of the world trading system is shifting as countries in Asia, Europe, and North America negotiate new trade agreements. However, none of these talks include both China and the United States, the two biggest economies in the world. In this pathbreaking study, C. Fred Bergsten, Gary...

In the coming year, Congress is likely to face a critical vote on granting Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) to Russia in connection with its impending membership to the World Trade Organization (WTO). A “yes” on PNTR for Russia could set the tone for economic relations between the...

In his 2012 State of the Union address, President Obama claimed that "over a thousand Americans are working today because we stopped a surge in Chinese tires." The tire tariff case, decided by the president in September 2009, exemplifies his efforts to get China to "play by the rules" and serves...

Together, US federal and state governments impose almost the highest corporate tax rate found among advanced countries, 39 percent. Only Japan is fractionally higher. The high US rate has adverse consequences—lost investment, lost jobs, and less innovation—and goes a long way to explain...