This Paper studies the relationship between trade liberalization and informality. It is often claimed that increased foreign competition in developing countries leads to an expansion of the informal sector, defined as the sector that does not comply with labour market legislation. Using data...

Protection unconstrained by rules often varies substantially over time. Rules-based disciplines, such as WTO tariff bindings and bindings on market access in services, constrain this variability. We examine the theoretical effects of such constraints on the expected cost of protection and offer...

We study the effects of trade barriers and the persistence of past linkages on trade flows in the former Soviet Union (FSU). Estimating a gravity equation on 1987-1996 trade among and between nine Russian regions and fourteen FSU republics, we find that Russian regions traded 60 percent more...

Geography shapes economic outcomes in a major way. This Paper uses spatial empirical methods to detect and analyse trade patterns in a historical dataset on Chinese rice prices. Our results suggest that spatial features were important for the expansion of interregional trade. Geography dictates,...

We estimate international technology spillovers to US manufacturing firms via imports and foreign direct investment (FDI) between the years 1987-96. In contrast to earlier work, our results suggest that FDI leads to significant productivity gains for domestic firms. The size of FDI spillovers is...

This paper presents a model in which long-run growth and industrial location are jointly endogenous. Specifically, it introduces Romer-Grossman-Helpman endogenous growth into Krugman’s core-periphery model with footloose labour. The paper focuses on stability of the symmetric equilibrium,...

We develop a criterion to distinguish two dominant paradigms of international trade theory: constant-returns perfectly competitive models, and increasing-returns monopolistically competitive models. Our analysis makes use of the pervasive presence of home-biased expenditure. It predicts that...

It has been a remarkably difficult empirical task to identify clear-cut real effects of exchange-rate regimes on the open economy. Similarly, no definitive view emerges as to the aggregate effects of capital account liberalizations. The main hypothesis of the Paper is that a direct and an...

It is a well known quandry that when countries open their financial sectors, foreign-owned banks appear to bring superior efficiency to their host markets but also charge higher markups on borrowed funds than their domestically owned rivals, with unknown impacts on interest rates and welfare....

Although the one-factor Ricardian trade model with external economies of scale plays a significant role for the understanding of important trade issues under increasing returns, it lacks a compelling graphical representation. We propose a convincing graphical exposition that uses both the PPF...