Firm heterogeneity and comparative advantage: the response of French firms to Turkey's entry in the European Customs Union

I analyse the effects of a reduction in the tariffs of a trading partner on the exports of domestic firms. More precisely, I focus on how cross-industry differences in factor intensities and within-industry differences in firm productivities shape the response of the extensive (decision to export) and the intensive (exported volumes per firm) margins of exports. I examine the response of French firms to the reduction of Turkish import tariffs that followed the entry of Turkey into the European Customs Union in 1996. A reduction in tariffs increases the probability to export and, surprisingly, the effect is stronger in comparatively disadvantaged sectors. I provide a possible explanation using a partial equilibrium model which includes firm-level heterogeneity and sector-level comparative advantage. In this model, as trade partner tariffs fall, the productivity threshold separating exporters from non-exporters decreases more in comparatively disadvantaged sectors. This occurs because, even if the productivity threshold to enter the export market falls in the same proportion as tariffs in all sectors, its level was initially higher in comparatively disadvantaged ones.heterogeneous firms, Custom Union, intensive and extensive margins

A Dual Measure of Uncertainty: The Deng Extropy

The extropy has recently been introduced as the dual concept of entropy. Moreover, in the context of the Dempster–Shafer evidence theory, Deng studied a new measure of discrimination, named the Deng entropy. In this paper, we define the Deng extropy and study its relation with Deng entropy, and examples are proposed in order to compare them. The behaviour of Deng extropy is studied under changes of focal elements. A characterization result is given for the maximum Deng extropy and, finally, a numerical example in pattern recognition is discussed in order to highlight the relevance of the new measure

Backward recalculation of seasonal series affected by economic crisis: a Model-Based-Link method for the case of Turkish GDP

When attempting to deal with the recalculation process, it is hard to answer the question “Does the recalculated series include economic events and seasonal behaviours in the past?”. This paper discusses some alternative backward recalculation methods and presents the applications and their results relative to the Turkish Gross Domestic Product (GDP) series. Using comparative analysis, it is shown that ordinary ARIMA forecasts and signal extraction methods are not successful at taking into account past events in the backward recalculated series. A new innovative method, named Modelbased-link, is then proposed and suggested by the authors in order to be able to take past economic events and seasonal patterns into account when the series is to be backward recalculated. A first application of this new method is run on the quarterly series of the Turkish GDP. In addition, it is shown that the Model-based-link method can be extended to data sets of different frequencies (i.e. annual data). Consequently, it can be claimed that a comparable recalculated quarterly and annual Turkish GDP series for forthcoming data is obtained. The paper is structured as following: section 1 introduces the reader to the state of the art in the current literature; section 2 defines the information set to be backward recalculated and presents some statistics on the data while section 3 presents the main methodological statistical aspects of classical methods compared to the methodological scheme of the Model-based-link that can be used for the recalculation process. Section 4 presents results of the methods mentioned in the previous section and section 5 discusses the extension of the Model-based-link method to monthly data and includes an application for annual data; section 6 concludes. Finally, section 7 presents topics for discussion and challenges for continuation of the analysis

Versal unfoldings for linear retarded functional differential equations

We consider parametrized families of linear retarded functional differential equations (RFDEs) projected onto finite-dimensional invariant manifolds, and address the question of versality of the resulting parametrized family of linear ordinary differential equations. A sufficient criterion for versality is given in terms of readily computable quantities. In the case where the unfolding is not versal, we show how to construct a perturbation of the original linear RFDE (in terms of delay differential operators) whose finite-dimensional projection generates a versal unfolding. We illustrate the theory with several examples, and comment on the applicability of these results to bifurcation analyses of nonlinear RFDEs

The effect of the Uruguay Round on the intensive and extensive margins of trade

Do tariffs inhibit trade flows by limiting the entry of exporting firms (`extensive margin') or by restricting the average volume exported by each firm (`intensive margin')? Using a gravity equation approach, we analyze how the decrease in tariffs promoted during the 1990s by the Uruguay Round multilateral trade agreement affected the trade margins of French firms across 57 sectors and in 147 countries, from 1993 to 2002. Our main contribution is to estimate the elasticity of trade for both margins, controlling for the unobserved heterogeneity of trade flows thanks to a three-dimensional panel and to time-varying tariffs as a measure of variable trade costs. Our results show that the number of firms exporting in a given sector to a given destination is related to the level of tariffs. But they also show that the decrease in tariffs determined by the implementation of the Uruguay Round did not lead more firms to export and instead, only encouraged incumbent exporters to increase their shipments. We control for two problems that may affect our basic specification: tariff changes may be endogenous and zero flows are not included. Our results are confirmed - even when the extensive margin is significant, its contribution is very small.tariffs, trade margins, Uruguay Round

AGRICULTURE PRODUCTION Flash Estimate 2004 and Forecast 2005

forecast, flash estimates