It is customary in the empirical trade literature to analyze specialization patterns of countries using Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA) measures. This paper explores the pros and cons of the most commonly used RCA index: the Balassa (1965) Index of RCA. After describing the properties of...

In this paper we look at similarity and convergence of trade patterns between the EU and four of the so-called "accession countries" of Central and Eastern Europe. We analyse the export patterns of the CEECs by comparing them to those of the current members of the EU. In particular, this paper...

In this paper we look at the similarity of trade structures in an integrating area. In particular, we analyse the export flows toward the EU market of four of the so-called "accession" countries of Central and Eastern Europe by comparing them to those of the pre-2004 members of the European...

This paper argues that offshoring indices often measure something different than what we think they are. Using data from input-output tables of 21 European countries from 1995 to 2006 we decompose an offshoring index, distinguishing between a domestic (structural change) and an international...

This paper studies how the structure of the International Trade Network (ITN) changes in geographical space and along time. We employ geographical distance between countries in the world to filter the links in the ITN, building a sequence of sub-networks, each one featuring trade links occurring...

In this paper we investigate the causal effect of immigration on trade flows, using Italian panel data covering very small geographical units (NUTS-3). Exploiting the very favorable setup offered by Italy's features – the very high number of countries of origin of immigrants...

In this paper we investigate the causal effect of immigration on tradeflows. We exploit the very favorable set-up offered by the Italian panel data — the fine geographical disaggregation (provinces, i.e., Nomenclature of territorial units for statistics 3 level l — NUTS-3), the very high...

In this paper we explore the BACI-CEPII database using Network Analysis. Starting from the visualization of the World Trade Network, we then define and describe the topology of the network, both in its binary version and in its weighted version, calculating and discussing some of the commonly...