Recent evidence on the respective contributions of institutions and trade to income levels across countries has demonstrated that - once endogeneity is considered - institutional quality clearly dominates the effect of trade. We argue that overall trade is not the most appropriate measure for...

We empirically analyse the impact of trade on income levels in the sub-Saharan African countries. The results indicate that the linkage between these two variables is negative for these countries. This outcome may explain the negative sign of the Africa dummy in income (or growth) regressions.