Under the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP), high-income countries grant unilateral trade preferences to developing countries. These preferences are subject to political conditionality, but little is known about the trade impact of loss of preferential access and the implications for...

How strongly can the reduction in bureaucracy and red tape at the border increase trade? To address this, we study an ambitious trade facilitation policy - the complete abolition of internal customs controls - in the Eurasian Customs Union. Using a structural gravity model with high-dimensional...

While “mega FTAs” and WTO-driven efforts at multilateral liberalisation dominate the agenda, customs unions (CU) are the silent success story of regional integration. Throughout the world, CUs have been superseding earlier FTAs, as new unions were formed or old ones expanded. Due to problems...

We use a unique case study to estimate the effect of withdrawing from a free trade agreement on international trade. Lately, the political opposition to international economic cooperation has been on the rise, but little is known about how the withdrawal from a trade agreement affects trade. We...

We use a unique case study to estimate the effect of withdrawing from a free trade agreement on international trade. Lately, the political opposition to international economic cooperation has been on the rise, but little is known about how the withdrawal from a trade agreement affects trade. We...

Commodity markets are linked through international trade but are separated by heterogeneous regulations and input markets. We investigate theoretically and empirically how regional, as opposed to global, cost shocks pass through into global prices. Capacity constraints mitigate the output...

Price discrimination by consumer's purchase history is widely used in regulated industries, such as communication or utilities, both by incumbents and entrants. I show that such discrimination can have surprisingly negative welfare effects { even though prices and industry profits fall, so does...

Food commodity prices escalated during the 2007/2008 food crisis, and have scarcely fallen since. We show that high fertilizer prices, driven by the formation of an international export cartel as well as high energy prices, explains the majority of the recent price spikes. In particular, we...

While it is well understood that industrialized countries use aid to grant political favors, little research covers alternative channels such as trade policy towards developing countries. We analyze eligibility investigations and revoking of U.S. Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) benefits...

We demonstrate that durable MFN tariff elimination affects trade patterns through several layers, and magnitudes of effects are sizable. The WTO Information Technology Agreement’s (ITA) unique setting allows us to overcome the challenges associated with identifying effects of...