This paper uses a vertical differentiation duopoly framework to analyze firms’ relocation decisions, when the removal of trade barriers or restrictions on capital outflows or inflows (“globalization”) allows them to serve the domestic market through foreign plants in low-wage countries....

We develop a two-country, balanced-growth intertemporal general equilibrium model to examine two predictions of the Balassa-Samuelson model, namely that (i) productivity differentials determine the domestic relative price of nontradables and (ii) deviations from purchasing power parity reflect...

This paper uses panel data for 19 OECD countries and finds support for the hypothesis that a greater degree of product variety relative to the United States helps to explain relative per capita GDP levels. The empirical work relies upon some direct measures of product variety calculated from...

This paper examines the effect of counterfeit goods in a world where consumers are differentiated by level of income and innovation is quality enhancing. Counterfeit goods are defined as products with the same characteristics as “originals”, but of lower quality. The effect of imitation on...

Businesses which seek the location that offers the highest profitability are likely to consider tax incentives and the level of government services available. However, once a business commits itself to a locality, high moving costs render it vulnerable to future tax increases or denial of...

Economists interested in location choices usually focus their attention on investments abroad. This neglects the fact that multinational enterprises continue to invest domestically while undertaking foreign expansion. This paper compares investments at home and abroad. Our firm-level dataset...

Real imports in China have decelerated significantly over the last two years to below 4 percent (yoy) from double-digit growth in previous years. Weaker investment, partly due to progress in rebalancing from investment to consumption, has been the main factor accounting for about 40-50 percent...

This paper presents a model of a multinational firm''s optimal debt policy that incorporates international taxation factors. The model yields the prediction that a multinational firm''s indebtedness in a country depends on a weighted average of national tax rates and differences between national...