We construct the first direct classification of goods as luxuries or necessities that is compatible with international trade data. We then use it to test an idea that has not been tested directly in the literature: countries income distributions are important determinants of their import demand,...

Some cultural goods, like clothes and films, are consumed socially and are thus characterized by the same consumption network externalities as languages. At the same time, producers of new cultural goods in any one country draw on the stock of ideas generated by previous cultural production in...

This paper reviews issues that lie at the intersection between intellectual property rights (IPR) and network effects, especially in the context of the global economy. Some of the relevant questions are: (1) How do IPR influence the provision of goods exhibiting network effects? (2) How do...