International Trade of Isolated Countries: The Case of Myanmar and North Korea

Using a gravity model, this study examines trade patterns of two isolated economies - Myanmar and North Korea. This study finds that two countries' trade is basically consistent with the prediction of the gravity model. However, economic sanctions toward these countries imposed by the U.S. and other developed countries have distorted their trade pattern, and it turns out that China is exerting its power in place of other santion-participating countries. Relevant policy implications follow.

Does Economic Sanction Work? The Case of North Korea

Based on the gravity model of international trade, this paper initially analyzes North Korea's international trade pattern, which tends to follow the prediction of the gravity model: a positive relationship between trade and trading partners' GDP, and negative relationship between trade and distance. This pattern has been consistently preserved over recent several years in spite of economic sanctions by various countries, implying that those sanctions do not significantly change North Korea's trade environment. This result lies on the substitutability of goods among countries. For example, North Korea has traded increasingly larger amount of goods with China and Korea since Japan imposed sanctions against Pyeongyang. Unless all countries strictly agree on imposing sanctions against a specific country, which is almost impossible to be realized, imposing economic sanction will turn out to be unsuccessful

International Trade of Isolated Countries: The Case of Myanmar and North Korea

Using a gravity model, this study examines trade patterns of two isolated economies - Myanmar and North Korea. This study finds that two countries' trade is basically consistent with the prediction of the gravity model. However, economic sanctions toward these countries imposed by the U.S. and other developed countries have distorted their trade pattern, and it turns out that China is exerting its power in place of other santion-participating countries. Relevant policy implications follow

The effects of trade openness on regional inequality in South Korea

노트 : 55th Congress of the European Regional Science Association: "World Renaissance:Changing roles for people and places", 25-28 August 2015, Lisbon, Portuga

How to Attract More Tourists to Korea? Possible Collaborations with China

Based on the gravity model, this paper analyzes China and South Korea¡¯s tourism patterns. Using a panel data set of China¡¯s international tourism flows from 32 countries for 1995-2012, and Korea¡¯s international tourism flows from 152 countries for 2005-2013, this study finds that the two countries¡¯ data sets are generally consistent with the predictions of the gravity model. We further investigated the predicted values of tourist flows with actual values to determine under-represented countries. Policy implications follow regarding how to attract more tourists to Korea

The Spatial Dimension Of Take-Offs And Sustainability: The Case Of East Asian Countries

This study examines the relationship between the size of a country and its “take-off” for economic development. We find that most countries which experienced economic upheavals in the past decades are relatively small in terms of area. Specifically, take-offs appear to be quicker for smaller landmasses with larger potential workforce and higher population density, controlled for financial markets maturity, corporate governance, economic openness, and human capital development. We also find that take-offs are not sustainable by nature as most countries in East Asia that which experience take-offs are currently facing slow-downs of their economies. Through this finding, we predict that China may experience a slow-down at around 36% and may reach to the 50-60% of income level of the U.S. 

Use of Recycled Rubber Particles for Leach Field Media in On-Site Wastewater Treatment Systems

Three different laboratory scale biofilter systems were demonstrated for septic tank effluent treatment to evaluate the use of recycled rubber particles (RRP) filter media compared to gravel and peat moss. The lab-scale RRP biofilter removed BOD5, ammonia nitrogen, and solids with over 90 % removal efficiency at various hydraulic loading rates ranging from 1.4 gal/ft2/d to 5.0 gal/ft2/d. The gravel system also showed good performance similar to the RRP system at similar hydraulic loading rates, with the exception of high effluent TSS (up to 100 mg/L) due to biomass sloughing. The peat moss biofiltration system showed lower removal efficiency in terms of COD and BOD5 removal than the other systems at loading rates from 1.4 gal/ ft2/d to 4.0 gal/ft2/d. The RRP system performed better than other in terms of organic and ammonia removal as well as fecal coliform control after system stability.This proceeding is published as Park, Jaeyoung, Jinhwan Oh, and Timothy G. Ellis. "Use of Recycled Rubber Particles for Leach Field Media in On-Site Wastewater Treatment Systems." In WEFTEC 2011, pp. 2775-2789. Water Environment Federation, 2011. Copyright ©2011 Water Environment Federation. Posted with permission

Synchrotron X-ray reflectivity studies of nanoporous organosilicate thin films with low dielectric constants

Quantitative, non-destructive X-ray reflectivity analysis using synchrotron radiation sources was successfully performed on nanoporous dielectric thin films prepared by thermal processing of blend films of a thermally curable polymethylsilsesquioxane dielectric precursor and a thermally labile triethoxy-silyl-terminated six-arm poly(epsilon-caprolactone) porogen in various compositions. In addition, thermogravimetric analysis and transmission electron microscopy analysis were carried out. These measurements provided important structural information about the nanoporous films. The thermal process used in this study was found to cause the porogen molecules to undergo efficiently sacrificial thermal degradation, generating closed, spherical nanopores in the dielectric film. The resultant nanoporous films exhibited a homogeneous, well defined structure with a thin skin layer and low surface roughness. In particular, no skin layer was formed in the porous film imprinted using a porogen loading of 30 wt%. The film porosities ranged from 0 to 33.8% over the porogen loading range of 0-30 wt%open131