Two issues stand out in this conversation. The first concerns the unfinished business of the global fight against the scourge of poverty, which impacts one region more than most: Africa. At the same time, a key pre-requisite for economic performance - affordable and efficient public...

In a seminal paper, Rose (2004) found that the assumed positive impact of the WTO on international trade was questionable. This finding has been scrutinized and modified in subsequent research, using different datasets, econometric methods and separating the WTO from other forms of trade...

The post Second World War liberal trade order has been a driver of global economic growth and rising average per capita incomes. This order confronts increasing opposition, reflecting concerns about adjustment costs and distributional effects of globalization, and the ability to pursue national...

This paper presents two empirical tools to quantify the impacts of tariff changes on bilateral trade and welfare. Both tools are rooted in the structural gravity literature. The first tool estimates the impact of tariff changes on bilateral trade for 5,020 products in a partial equilibrium...

In a seminal paper, Rose (2004) found that the assumed positive impact of the WTO on international trade was questionable. This finding has been scrutinized and modified in subsequent research, using different datasets, econometric methods and separating the WTO from other forms of trade...

Regional economic integration is back in vogue following the "stumble" in the Doha Round in July 2008. Preferential trade agreements (PTAs) are driving this trend in Asia and the Pacific as well as in Central and South America, and the sheer volume of PTAs is striking. In the 1990s there were...

This paper documents the novel fact that Regional Trade Agreements (RTA) decrease bilateral trade imbalances as measured by conventional measure of the net export share in gross trade. While on average an RTA decreases bilateral trade imbalance by 7%, greater trade integration through a deeper...

This paper shows that a regional bias resulting from trade integration alters the transmission of a countryś monetary policy by shifting the burden of the exchange rate adjustment towards the less integrated trading partners. I first develop a simple model which illustrates how a concentration...

Gravity equations have been used for more than 50 years to estimate ex post the partial effects of trade costs on international trade flows, and the well-known - and traditionally presumed exogenous - "trade-cost elasticity" plays a central role in computing general equilibrium trade-flow and...

This paper examines the relationship between mega-regional trade Agreements and diet-related health given that such Agreements aim to liberalize “substantially all trade and investment” that could potentially impact on health through tariff elimination and stronger intellectual property...