Standards and technical regulations exist to protect consumer safety or to achieve other goals, such as ensuring the interoperability of telecommunications systems, for example. Standards and technical regulations can, however, raise substantially both start-up and production costs for firms....

In a small open economy model where imports (exports) are differentiated by region of origin (destination), the welfare effects of a preferential trade agreement (PTA) are considered. Trade creation is found to be a concave function of pre-union partner trade shares. This contrasts with earlier...