對外貿易大學講師之國際貿易英文講稿

1、Dynamic Effects and Economic GrowthThe simple comparative advantage model assumed that trade dose not change a country's stock of resources or the efficiency with which it utilizes those resources. This static assump

2、tion makes no allowances for the dynamic changes that might result from trade. If we relax this assumption, it becomes apparent that opening an economy to trade is likely to generate dynamic gains of two sorts. First, fr

3、ee trade might increase a country's stock of resources as increased supplies of labor and capital from abroad become available for use within the country. For example, more resources have become available in Eastern

4、Europe since the early 1990s since many Western businesses have been investing significant capital in the former Communist countries.Second, free trade might also increase the efficiency with which a country uses its res

5、ources. Gains in the efficiency of resource utilization could arise from a number of factors. For example, economies of large-scale production might become available as trade expands the size of the total market availabl

6、e to domestic firms. Trade might make better technology from abroad available to domestic firms; better technology can increase labor productivity or the productivity of land.(The so-called green revolution had this eff

7、ect on agricultural outputs in developing countries.) Also, opening an economy to foreign competition might stimulate domestic producers to look for ways to increase their efficiency. Again, this phenomenon has arguably

8、been occurring in the once-protected markets of Eastern Europe, where many former state monopolies have had to increase the efficiency of their operations to survive in the competitive world market.The Samuelson Critique

9、Samuelson’s critique looks at what happens when a rich country—the United States—enters into a free trade agreement with a poor country—China—that rapidly improves its productivity after deadweight distortion losses.’’So

10、me economists have been quick to dismiss Samuelson’s fears. While not questioning his analysis, they note that as a practical matter developing nations are unlikely to be able to upgrade the skill level of their workforc

11、e rapidly enough to give rise to the situation in Samuelson’s model. In other words, they will quickly run into diminishing returns. To quote one such rebuttal: “The notion that India and China will quickly educate 300 m

12、illion of their citizens to acquire sophisticated and complex skills at stake borders on the ludicrous. The educational sectors in these countries face enormous difficulties”. Notwithstanding such rebuttals, however, Sam

13、uelson’s stature is such that his work will undoubtedly be debated for some time to come.Evidence for the Link between Trade and GrowthMany economic studies have looked at the relationship between trade and economic grow

14、th. In general, these studies suggest that, as predicted by the standard theory of comparative advantage, countries that adopt a more open stance toward international trade enjoy higher growth rates than those that close

15、 their economies to trade (the opening case provides evidence of the link between trade and growth).Jeffrey Sachs and Andrew Warner created a measure of how “open” to international trade an economy was and then looked at

16、 the relationship between “openness” and economic growth for a sample of more than 100 countries from 1970 to 1990.Among other findings, they reported:We find a strong association between openness and growth, both within

17、 the group of developing and the group of developed countries. Within the group of developing countries, the open economies grew at 4.49 percent per year, and the closed economies grew at 0.69 percent per year. Within th