Trade

In the second of two articles, Jeff Alvares analyzes the competing arguments around Pix under World Trade Organization rules—a debate involving broader questions about how international trade rules need to reflect the complexity of public services in the digital economy.

In the first of two articles, Jeff Alvares explores how Brazil’s public digital payments system achieved transformative financial inclusion through vertically integrated infrastructure, creating a model now facing scrutiny under international trade law and raising questions about the boundaries of legitimate public infrastructure provision.

In new research, Yusheng Feng, Haishi Li, Siwei Wang, and Min Zhu show that higher industrial subsidies raise the likelihood and severity of foreign antidumping and countervailing duties. These retaliatory duties wipe out roughly a quarter of the revenue growth the subsidies would otherwise create for firms. Failing to address the potential consequences of subsidies may lead governments to overstate the net benefits of industrial policy and fuel deeper trade frictions.

Many studies have assumed that United States tariff costs are passed onto consumers. In new research, Vanessa Alviarez, Michele Fioretti, Ken Kikkawa, and Monica Morlacco argue that buyer-seller relationship dynamics allow dominant U.S. importers to instead force higher costs onto exporters.

President Donald Trump has, across two administrations, sought to lower drug prices for Americans, most recently with executive order “Delivering Most-Favored-Nation Prescription Drug Pricing to American Patients.” Margherita Colangelo explains why his order is unlikely to accomplish its goal.

David Chan Smith argues that tariff regimes during the eighteenth century encouraged modern history’s first offshore markets to reroute goods through jurisdictions that faced lower tariff rates. This historical “entrepôt trade” could outstrip the legal trade of some goods and carries lessons for contemporary revisions to international trade.

While governments have forged ahead with various industrial policies in areas such as clean energy and semiconductors, we still have much to learn about the historical efficacy of such interventions. Réka Juhász and Claudia Steinwender evaluate the growing literature on nineteenth century industrial policy and possible paths for future research.

Four economists discuss the trends in the global economy they are tracking in 2024

Industrial policy was once so out of fashion that it was jokingly called “the policy that shall not be named.” Now it’s back in...

Lobbying on free trade agreements has been dominated by a few very large firms, which experience large gains as a result of the entry...