3 results
26 - Revised emissions growth projections for China: why post-Kyoto climate policy must look east
- Edited by Joseph E. Aldy, Robert N. Stavins, Harvard University, Massachusetts
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- Book:
- Post-Kyoto International Climate Policy
- Published online:
- 05 June 2012
- Print publication:
- 03 December 2009, pp 822-856
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Summary
Introduction
Growth rates in energy-related emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) in developing countries, particularly the People's Republic of China, have increased rapidly in recent years. Emissions from the original signatories to the Kyoto Protocol (known as “Annex B countries”)— essentially the developed world and economies in transition—will almost certainly be surpassed by emissions from non-Annex B countries before 2010. Previous analyses projected that this crossing point would occur in 2020 or later (Weyant et al. 1999). The main source of unexpected emissions growth is China. According to the historical record provided by Marland et al. (2008), since 2000 the average annual growth rate in China's emissions has exceeded 10 percent, compared to 2.8 percent in the 1990s. Globally, the average growth rate since 2000 has been 3.3 percent, compared to 1.1 percent in the 1990s.
Raupach et al. (2007) decompose emissions growth in several regions into the factors of the Kaya identity: population, per capita income, energy intensity of gross domestic product (GDP), and carbon intensity of energy. In China, the first and last factors have been stable: population growth is slow and carbon intensity has remained consistently high due to heavy reliance on coal. Emissions growth has been driven by a combination of rapid economic development and the reversal of the past trend of declining energy intensity. Between 1980 and 2000, energy intensity in China had been falling faster than in any other major economy. This decline has been attributed to efficiency improvements at the firm level as market reforms privatized formerly state-operated enterprises (Fisher-Vanden et al. 2004).
9 - Blueprints, spillovers, and the dynamic gains from trade liberalization in a small open economy
- Edited by Richard E. Baldwin, Joseph F. Francois, Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam
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- Book:
- Dynamic Issues in Commercial Policy Analysis
- Published online:
- 13 January 2010
- Print publication:
- 06 May 1999, pp 269-322
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Summary
Introduction
International trade economists have typically argued that an open trade regime is very important for economic development. This view has been based partly on neoclassical trade theory, which generally finds that a country improves its welfare from trade liberalization; partly on casual empirical observation that countries that remain highly protected for long periods of time appear to suffer significantly and perhaps cumulatively; and partly on systematic empirical work that also finds trade liberalization beneficial to welfare and growth (e.g. World Bank (1987) and Sachs and Warner (1995)). What has been troubling is that the numerical estimates of the impact of trade liberalization have generally found that trade liberalization increases the welfare of a country by only about 1 per cent of GDP, gains that are small in relation to the paradigm.
With the development of endogenous growth theory (for example, Romer (1990), Grossman and Helpman (1991), and Segerstrom et al. (1990)) a clear theoretical link has been provided from trade liberalization to economic growth. Owing to the complexity of the models, the theoretical literature has necessarily been based on rather aggregated models, and has focused on the steady-state growth path. In this paper we develop a dynamic numerical, which allows us to derive a number of interesting properties. One contribution of our paper relative to the theoretical literature is that we trace out the dynamic adjustment path of all the variables in the model and evaluate the welfare consequences of a change in policies; i.e. two policies that achieve the same steady-state growth path could have very different welfare consequences as a result of the dynamic adjustment path.
8 - The Auto Industry and the North American Free Trade Agreement
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- By Florencio López-de-Silanes, Harvard University and NBER, James R. Markusen, University of Colorado, Boulder, and NBER, Thomas F. Rutherford, University of Colorado, Boulder
- Edited by Joseph F. Francois, General Agreement on Tariffs & Trade, Clinton R. Shiells
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- Book:
- Modeling Trade Policy
- Published online:
- 25 March 2010
- Print publication:
- 24 June 1994, pp 223-255
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Summary
Introduction
In December 1992, the heads of state of the United States, Canada, and Mexico signed a trade agreement that could significantly liberalize trade between these neighboring countries in North America. This chapter provides an analysis of the effects of the new agreement on one industry – the automotive sector. We focus on production, employment, and consumer welfare effects of the agreement as simulated in a calibrated general equilibrium model that accounts for production and trade in automotive parts, engines, and finished automobiles. The model distinguishes between the effects of the agrement on the “Big Three” North American firms and on foreign firms producing in North America. This distinction is quite important because the new agreement will introduce significant nontariff barriers (NTBs) in the form of content rules for firms selling in the expanded North American market. The model we have developed provides a framework in which we can evaluate the effects of these important new nontariff barriers that may become permanent features of the North American economic landscape.
The analytical framework employed in this chapter is based on two earlier papers [Hunter, Markusen, and Rutherford (1990) and López-de-Silanes, Markusen, and Rutherford, 1992)]. In this chapter, we have extended our previous modeling work in several areas. First, we now distinguish two primary factor inputs to production: labor, and capital. Second, our new model accounts for more aspects of intrafirm competition in the international auto market.