Trade Agreements, Political Economy and Endogenously Incomplete Contracts

We develop a political economy model of trade agreements following along the line of Grossman and Helpman (1995a) yet incorporating contracting costs, uncertainty and multiple policy instruments. We show that rent-seeking efforts do not affect tariff rates as they are offset by the substitution effect of domestic production subsidies. Similar to Horn et al (2010), we find the coexistence of uncertainty and contracting costs make optimal trade agreements incomplete contracts. Our model helps explain differential treatment on subsidies, countervailing duties, and the national treatment principle - all key provisions of the current WTO agreement.Trade agreement, political economy, contracting cost, uncertainty JEL Classification:, Agricultural and Food Policy, International Relations/Trade, Political Economy, Public Economics,

Retrospective harm benefit analysis of pre-clinical animal research for six treatment interventions

The harm benefit analysis (HBA) is the cornerstone of animal research regulation and is considered to be a key ethical safeguard for animals. The HBA involves weighing the anticipated benefits of animal research against its predicted harms to animals but there are doubts about how objective and accountable this process is.i. To explore the harms to animals involved in pre-clinical animal studies and to assess these against the benefits for humans accruing from these studies; ii. To test the feasibility of conducting this type of retrospective HBA.Data on harms were systematically extracted from a sample of pre-clinical animal studies whose clinical relevance had already been investigated by comparing systematic reviews of the animal studies with systematic reviews of human studies for the same interventions (antifibrinolytics for haemorrhage, bisphosphonates for osteoporosis, corticosteroids for brain injury, Tirilazad for stroke, antenatal corticosteroids for neonatal respiratory distress and thrombolytics for stroke). Clinical relevance was also explored in terms of current clinical practice. Harms were categorised for severity using an expert panel. The quality of the research and its impact were considered. Bateson's Cube was used to conduct the HBA.The most common assessment of animal harms by the expert panel was 'severe'. Reported use of analgesia was rare and some animals (including most neonates) endured significant procedures with no, or only light, anaesthesia reported. Some animals suffered iatrogenic harms. Many were kept alive for long periods post-experimentally but only 1% of studies reported post-operative care. A third of studies reported that some animals died prior to endpoints. All the studies were of poor quality. Having weighed the actual harms to animals against the actual clinical benefits accruing from these studies, and taking into account the quality of the research and its impact, less than 7% of the studies were permissible according to Bateson's Cube: only the moderate bisphosphonate studies appeared to minimise harms to animals whilst being associated with benefit for humans.This is the first time the accountability of the HBA has been systematically explored across a range of pre-clinical animal studies. The regulatory systems in place when these studies were conducted failed to safeguard animals from severe suffering or to ensure that only beneficial, scientifically rigorous research was conducted. Our findings indicate a pressing need to: i. review regulations, particularly those that permit animals to suffer severe harms; ii. reform the processes of prospectively assessing pre-clinical animal studies to make them fit for purpose; and iii. systematically evaluate the benefits of pre-clinical animal research to permit a more realistic assessment of its likely future benefits

Role of biomechanics in the understanding of normal, injured, and healing ligaments and tendons

Ligaments and tendons are soft connective tissues which serve essential roles for biomechanical function of the musculoskeletal system by stabilizing and guiding the motion of diarthrodial joints. Nevertheless, these tissues are frequently injured due to repetition and overuse as well as quick cutting motions that involve acceleration and deceleration. These injuries often upset this balance between mobility and stability of the joint which causes damage to other soft tissues manifested as pain and other morbidity, such as osteoarthritis

Variants within the MMP3 gene and patellar tendon properties in vivo in an asymptomatic population

Background/aim Gene variants encoding for proteins involved in homeostatic processes within tendons may influence its material and mechanical properties in humans. The purpose of this study was to examine the association between three polymorphisms of the MMP3 gene, (rs679620, rs591058 and rs650108) and patellar tendon dimensional and mechanical properties in vivo. Methods One hundred and sixty, healthy, recreationally-active, Caucasian men and women, aged 18–39 were recruited. MMP3 genotype determined using real-time PCR was used to select 84 participants showing greatest genetic differences to complete phenotype measurements. Patellar tendon dimensions (volume) and functional (elastic modulus) properties were assessed in vivo using geometric modelling, isokinetic dynamometry, electromyography and ultrasonography. Results No significant associations were evident between the completely linked MMP3 rs591058 and rs679620 gene variants, and closely linked rs650108 gene variant, and either patellar tendon volume (rs679620, P = 0.845; rs650108, P = 0.984) or elastic modulus (rs679620, P = 0.226; rs650108, P = 0.088). Similarly, there were no associations with the Z-score that combined those dimension and functional properties into a composite value (rs679620, P = 0.654; rs650108, P = 0.390). Similarly, no association was evident when comparing individuals with/without the rarer alleles (P > 0.01 in all cases). Conclusions Patellar tendon properties do not seem to be influenced by the MMP3 gene variants measured. Although these MMP3 gene variants have previously been associated with the risk of tendon pathology, that association is unlikely to be mediated via underlying tendon dimensional and functional properties

Political Economy, Uncertainty, and Contracting Costs: Agriculture and the Negotiation of Trade Agreements

Recent negotiations of the United States Mexico Canada Agreement (USMCA) and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) highlight the impact of contracting costs, uncertainty, and the importance of political welfare. Agriculture exhibits these traits perhaps more than any other sector and subsequently tends to be pivotal in many trade negotiations. Moreover, these traits are -- to some extent -- responsible for the large increase in Regional Trade Agreements (RTAs). In this manuscript we extend the political economy model of trade agreements to include both contracting costs and uncertainty. Uncertainty is incorporated through trade and policy shocks while contracting costs are incorporated as a function of the number of policy instruments. The optimal conditions on domestic support differ considerably if governments maximize social surplus only versus some linear combination of both social surplus and private political welfare. We also show that the politically optimal structure of trade agreements allows for countervailing duties. Our model helps explain: (a) why tariffs rather than production subsidies are more common in agriculture; (b) differential treatment of agricultural producers in developed versus developing countries; (c) continued presence of agricultural subsidies in many RTAs even under significant trade volume growth; and (d) the trend toward harmonization of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Standards (SPS) measures

Trade Agreements, Political Economy and Endogenously Incomplete Contracts

We develop a political economy model of trade agreements following along the line of Grossman and Helpman (1995a) yet incorporating contracting costs, uncertainty and multiple policy instruments. We show that rent-seeking efforts do not affect tariff rates as they are offset by the substitution effect of domestic production subsidies. Similar to Horn et al (2010), we find the coexistence of uncertainty and contracting costs make optimal trade agreements incomplete contracts. Our model helps explain differential treatment on subsidies, countervailing duties, and the national treatment principle - all key provisions of the current WTO agreement

Modelling Regime-Dependent Price Volatility Transmissions Between China and U.S. Agricultural Markets: A Normal Mixture Bivariate GARCH Approach

Agricultural trade amongst and between the United States and China dominates world markets and has been complicated by rapid growth, significant changes in domestic farm policy, intermittent periods of considerable volatility, and, most recently, trade tensions. It is unlikely that a single GARCH process can adequately accommodate this vacillation. Not surprisingly, past literature has shown conflicting results depending on the period considered. We use mixture methods which let the data define the number of possibly heterogeneous volatility regimes. We model the price volatility transmissions for five commodities: soybeans, wheat, corn, sugar, and cotton. Specifically, we estimate, test, and find the presence of multiple regimes using a normal mixture multivariate GARCH model. We identify different economic structures across the regimes. While we find that the U.S. tends to play a leading role over China in terms of spillover effects, when the market state is unstable or highly volatile, we tend to find greater bidirectional volatility spillovers. Most importantly, we show that the standard approach of modelling spillover volatilities as a single regime is not valid

A Camera-Based Experimental Method for Mechanical Test on Patellar TendonsMechanics of Biological Systems and Materials, Volume 7

Tendons have an important structural function in biological systems, their mechanical proprieties are therefore of great interest in biomechanics engineering and reconstructive medicine. Their physiological characteristics require the study of specific experimental methods able to determine the mechanical properties. In this work the authors propose a non-contact experimental method aimed to the characterization of the mechanical proprieties of rabbit patellar tendons based on the use of a single camera and a customized gripping system. The tensile test setup makes use of a fixed lens camera and a customized algorithm, providing the measurement of the local sample strain on different part along the tendon and of the cross-sectional area. The tensile stress is estimated by the value of the applied load and of the cross-section value of the sample; tensile stress values are calculated at a frequency of 8 Hz. Moreover a special design of the clamps and the use of the camera allow to protect the experimental tests from the well-known problem of peak force concentrations on the sample and slipping at its extremities, which indeed are typical problems in tensile testing of tendons