The empirical relationship between trade protection and economic growth is surprisinglyfragile, as shown in a number of other papers. After demonstrating this empiricalsensitivity, we address one possible explanation for these findings: that the relationshipis nonlinear. Following the endogenous...

This paper examines the relative contribution of openness and the R&D content of trade to TFP growth for North-South trade-related technology diffusion. The measure of foreign R&D used in the literature on trade-related technology diffusion imposes identical contributions of openness and the R&D...

Do better trade logistics reduce trade costs, raising a country´s exports? Yes, but the magnitude of the effectdepends on country size. Applying a new gravity model to a comprehensive logistics index, we …nd that anaverage-sized country would raise exports by about 46% after a one-standard...

World governance today is characterized by international organizationslacking democratic legitimacy and control by the citizens they claim to represent. Theyare also criticized for being inefficient. This leads to violent protests and to NGOs havinggreat influence. To address these problems, we...

This paper argues that corruption patterns are endogenous to political structures. Thus, corruption can be systemic and planned rather than decentralized and coincidental. In an economic system without law or property rights, a kleptocratic state may arise as a predatory hierarchy from a state...

Microfoundations of the euro´s effect on euro area trade hinge on the timing, thespeed and the size of adjustment in trade costs. We estimate timing, speed and sizeof adjustment in trade costs for sectoral trade data. Our approach allows for sectorspecific impacts of trade costs on sectoral...

Our paper deals with econometric developments for the estimation of the gravity model whichlead to convergent parameter estimates even when a correlation exists between theexplanatory variables and the specific unobservable characteristics of each unit. Weimplement panel data econometric...

In this paper, we analyse competition among jurisdictions to attract firms through low taxes oncapital and/or high level of public goods, which enhance firms’ productivity. We assume that thecompeting jurisdictions are different in (population) size and that the mobility of capital is...

This paper provides, and empirically estimates, a model of sovereign default risk on external debt,in which the sovereign endogenously determines the timing of defaulting. The paper o¤ers theoreticalpredictions of the relationship between credit spreads and related macro-variables that are...

While the regional economic integration encompassing the former Soviet Union (FSU) transpiresto be inefficient, there appears to be a stronger interest in regionalism in smaller groupsof more homogenous and geographically connected countries of the region, specifically, CentralAsia. Using a new...