This paper develops and empirically examines a model of relative productivity differences both within and across industries for small open economies. We decompose the effect of industry productivity on export performance into direct effect of own-firm productivity and an indirect effect of...

We estimate the effect of interstate highways on the level and composition of trade for US cities. Highways within cities have a large effect on the weight of city exports with an elasticity of approximately 0.5. We find little effect of highways on the total value of exports. Consistent with...

This paper examines the effect of labor coercion on human capital accumulation. We use micro data from Puerto Rico, where unskilled laborers were forced to work for landowners during 1849–1874. Using variation in municipality-level suitability for coffee cultivation and international coffee...

This paper derives and estimates a unified and tractable model of comparative advantage due to differences in both factor abundance and relative productivity differences across industries. It derives conditions under which ignoring one force for comparative advantage biases empirical tests of...