The fact that trade, and especially agricultural trade, remains far from free is puzzling, since the superiority of free trade receives overwhelming support among economists (Gawande and Krishna, 2003; Rodrik, 1994). International trade scholars have devoted significant resources to forecasting the...

Global food commodity price inflation beginning in 2006 and continuing through mid-2008 became a priority concern for global consumers, producers and policy-makers alike. In response, many governments across the world implemented policies targeting high food commodity prices in their domestic...

This article tests the Grossman-Helpman Protection for Sale model using panel data from U.S. food processing industries with endogenous protection, imports, and political organization of industries. The results support the key predictions of the model: organized industries are granted higher...

In the paper we provide an explanation of the persistence of the commodity titles in US farm bills that is grounded in core theories of the policy process from the political science literature. The political science literature explains policy continuity and policy change from a number of...

This article tests the Protection for Sale (PFS) model using detailed data from U.S. food processing industries from 1978 to 1992 under alternative import demand specifications. All empirical results support the PFS model predictions and previous empirical work qualitatively. Although welfare...

The paper analyses the 1996 EU food aid reform and addresses the question of its impact on improving EU food aid allocation in terms of reaching those countries which are most vulnerable to food insecurity. Using a two-stage regression model the analysis finds that EU food aid in kind is...

Agricultural input subsidies often have implicit or explicit political economy objectives. Using panel data from Zambia, this article empirically tests whether election outcomes affect targeting of subsidized fertilizer and whether fertilizer subsidies win votes. Results suggest that the Zambian...

This article tests the Grossman-Helpman Protection for Sale model using panel data from U.S. food processing industries with endogenous protection, imports, and political organization of industries. The results support the key predictions of the model: organized industries are granted higher...

This article tests the Protection for Sale (PFS) model using detailed data from U.S. food processing industries from 1978 to 1992 under alternative import demand specifications. All empirical results support the PFS model predictions and previous empirical work qualitatively. Although welfare...

The purpose of this paper is to examine politically sensitive food safety problems from the viewpoint of political economy. The model was built in order to clarify the behaviors of consumers and politicians, employing the prospect theory and the median voter theorem. Major findings and policy...