Macroeconomic Effects of Price Controls: The Role of Market Structure

Price controls were part of Israel's stabilization program of July 1985. Some results of the program seem to be inconsistent with competitive macroeconomic models. It is suggested that these results are consistent with an economy that has an oligopolistic market structure. The paper explores the effects of market structure on macroeconomic performance in the presence and absence of price control.

Trade, FDI, and the Organization of Firms

New developments in the world economy have triggered research designed to better understand the changes in trade and investment patterns, and the reorganization of production across national borders. Although traditional trade theory has much to offer in explaining parts of this puzzle, other parts required new approaches. Particularly acute has been the need to model alternative forms of involvement of business firms in foreign activities, because organizational change has been central in the transformation of the world economy. This paper reviews the literature that has emerged from these efforts. The theoretical refinements have focused on the individual firm, studying its choices in response to its own characteristics, the nature of the industry in which it operates, and the opportunities afforded by foreign trade and investment. Important among these choices are organizational features, such as sourcing strategies. But the theory has gone beyond the individual firm, studying the implications of firm behavior for the structure of industries. It provides new explanations for trade structure and patterns of FDI, both within and across industries, and has identified new sources of comparative advantage.

Inflationary Consequences of Anticipated Macroeconomic Policies

We consider a model in which the level of taxes and seignorage are too low to finance government expenditures and debt service. Government debt will therefore grow without bound, implying the eventual need to change policy. Starting with utility maximization, we analyze the effect of the expected switch on equilibrium time paths before the switch takes place. We analyze stabilization via increasing taxes, increasing money growth rates, or cutting expenditures, both under certainty and under uncertainty about the composition or timing of a stabilization. Under full certainty, inflation may rise, fall, or remain constant before the stabilization, depending on which policy tool is used to stabilize. Uncertainty solely about the composition of the stabilization will yield paths in between the above cases, with a price jump at the time of stabilization. In general there is no simple correlation between changes in the budget deficit and inflation. With uncertainty about the timing OF a stabilization, the inflation rate will most likely exhibit fluctuations and may overshoot its steady state value, even when real balances move monotonically. Uncertainty about the timing of a stabilization can therefore itself induce fluctuation in inflation, even if underlying utility and subjective probability functions are smooth.

Contractual Frictions and Global Sourcing

We generalize the Antras and Helpman (2004) model of the international organization of production in order to accommodate varying degrees of contractual frictions. In particular, we allow the degree of contractibility to vary across inputs and countries. A continuum of firms with heterogeneous productivities decide whether to integrate or outsource the production of intermediate inputs, and from which country to source them. Final-good producers and their suppliers make relationship-specific investments which are only partially contractible, both in an integrated firm and in an arm's-length relationship. We describe equilibria in which firms with different productivity levels choose different ownership structures and supplier locations, and then study the effects of changes in the quality of contractual institutions on the relative prevalence of these organizational forms. Better contracting institutions in the South raise the prevalence of offshoring, but may reduce the relative prevalence of FDI or foreign outsourcing. The impact on the composition of offshoring depends on whether the institutional improvement affects disproportionately the contractibility of a particular input. A key message of the paper is that improvements in the contractibility of inputs controlled by final-good producers have different effects than improvements in the contractibility of inputs controlled by suppliers.

Global Sourcing

We present a North—South model of international trade in which differentiated products are developed in the North. Sectors are populated by final-good producers who differ in productivity levels. Based on productivity and sectoral characteristics, firms decide whether to integrate into the production of intermediate inputs or outsource them. In either case they have to decide from which country to source the inputs. Final-good producers and their suppliers must make relationship-specific investments, both in an integrated firm and in an arm’s-length relationship. We describe an equilibrium in which firms with diferent productivity levels choose diferent ownership structures and supplier locations, i. e. , they choose different organizational forms. We then study the efects of within-sectoral heterogeneity and variations in industry characteristics on the relative prevalence of these organizational forms. The analysis sheds light on the structure of foreign trade within and across industries.

Exchange Rate Management: Intertemporal Tradoffs

The management of the exchange rate is possible only if the government pursues a monetary-fiscal policy mix which is consistent with its exchange rate targets. In this paper with uncertainty concerning the length of individual life the real consequences of exchange rate management depend on the precise time pattern of the accompanying policies. We look at a stylized example of disinflation by means of exchange rate targetting with an initial overvalued currency and a delayed accompanying absorbtion policy. The result will be an intergenerational redistribution of welfare whereby spending rises during the initial period and falls during later periods, while the external debt rises in all periods.

Labor Market Rigidities, Trade and Unemployment

We study a two-country two-sector model of international trade in which one sector produces homogeneous products while the other produces differentiated products. The differentiated-product industry has firm heterogeneity, monopolistic competition, search and matching in its labor market, and wage bargaining. Some of the workers searching for jobs end up being unemployed. Countries are similar except for frictions in their labor markets. We study the interaction of labor market rigidities and trade impediments in shaping welfare, trade flows, productivity, price levels and unemployment rates. We show that both countries gain from trade but that the flexible country -- which has lower labor market frictions -- gains proportionately more. A flexible labor market confers comparative advantage; the flexible country exports differentiated products on net. A country benefits by lowering frictions in its labor market, but this harms the country's trade partner. And the simultaneous proportional lowering of labor market frictions in both countries benefits both of them. The model generates rich patterns of unemployment. Specifically, trade integration -- which benefits both countries -- may raise their rates of unemployment. Moreover, differences in rates of unemployment do not necessarily reflect differences in labor market rigidities; the rate of unemployment can be higher or lower in the flexible country. Finally, we show that the flexible country has both higher total factor productivity and a lower price level, which operates against the standard Balassa-Samuelson effect.

Endogenous Macroeconomic Growth Theory

The paper focuses on the innovation-based approach to endogenous growth. It begins by spelling out conditions for sustained long-run growth in neoclassical economies and uses these conditions as a standard of comparison for the conditions required to sustain long-run growth in economies with product innovation. It presents two models of product innovation that can sustain growth in the long run. The models share the same fundamental mechanism of economic growth. They are used to derive a variety of implications relating structural features to long-run growth rates and they are then applied to a number of policy issues. The usefulness of the approach represented by these models is examined by considering a number of issues, such as unemployment and trade relations.

Outsourcing versus FDI in Industry Equilibrium

We study the determinants of the extent of outsourcing and of direct foreign investment in an industry in which producers need specialized components. Potential suppliers must make a relationship-specific investment in order to serve each prospective customer. Such investments are governed by imperfect contracts. A final-good producer can manufacture components for itself, but the per-unit cost is higher than for specialized suppliers. We consider how the size of the cost differential, the extent of contractual incompleteness, the size of the industry, and the relative wage rate affect the organization of industry production.outsourcing, direct foreign investment, multinational corporations, imperfect contracting, intra-industry trade

Outsourcing in a Global Economy?

We study the determinants of the location of sub-contracted activity in a general equilibrium model of outsourcing and trade. We model outsourcing as an activity that requires search for a partner and relationship-specific investments that are governed by incomplete contracts. The extent of international outsourcing depends inter alia on the thickness of the domestic and foreign market for input suppliers, the relative cost of searching in each market, the relative cost of customizing inputs, and the nature of the contracting environment in each country.