Comparative Advantage, Trade, and Payments in a Ricardian Model with a Continuum of Goods
1977; American Economic Association; Volume: 67; Issue: 5 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
1944-7981
AutoresRüdiger Dornbusch, Stanley Fischer, Paul A. Samuelson,
Tópico(s)Economic theories and models
ResumoThis paper discusses Ricardian trade and payments theory in the case of a continuum of goods. The analysis thus extends the development of many-commodity, two-country comparative advantage analysis as presented, for example, in Gottfried Haberler (1937), Frank Graham (1923), Paul Samuelson (1964), and Frank W. Taussig (1927). The literature is historically reviewed by John Chipman (1965). Perhaps surprisingly, the continuum assumption simplifies the analysis neatly in comparison with the discrete many-commodity case. The distinguishing feature of the Ricardian approach emphasized in this paper is the determination of the competitive margin in production between imported and exported goods. The analysis advances the existing literature by formally showing precisely how tariffs and transport costs establish a range of commodities that are not traded, and how the price-specie flow mechanism does or does not give rise to movements in relative cost and price levels. The formal real model is introduced in Section 1. Its equilibrium determines the relative wage and price structure and the efficient international specialization pattern. Section II considers standard comparative static questions of growth, demand shifts,
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