文档介绍：Trade Liberalisation and “Revealed”
Comparative Advantage’
I
In discussions on the possible effects of trade liberalisation in
the framework of the Kennedy-round, attention has been focused
on the short-run problems of adjustment and the consequences
for the balance-of-payments of the countries participating in the
negotiations. At the same time, little attention has been paid to
the enduring e2ects of trade liberalisation : the reallocation of
resources following the freeing of trade barriers. In the present
paper, we propose to examine the latter problem.
Since the reallocation of resources depends parative
advantage, we have to ascertain where parative advantage
of industrial countries lies in their trade with each other. One
possible solution would be to parisons on the basis
of a production census undertaken simultaneously-and using
identical methods of investigation-in all countries. In practice,
production censuses have been conducted at different times,
using different methods of inquiry, and sufficient information for
making intercountry parisons has not been made
available.
An exception is the case of the United States and the United
Kingdom where interindustry parisons have been made
for the year 1950 in a study prepared for anisation for
European Economic Co- But 1950 can hardly be
regarded a “ normal” year in any sense and, at any rate, the long
time elapsed since this inquiry has reduced the value of the
comparisons. For present purposes, a further deficiency of the
estimates is that costs have been defined as value added inclusive
of depreciation, so that material costs are excluded while profits
are coniprisctl in the ‘‘ cost ” figures.
‘Data collection and calculations were carried out in the framework of the
Atlantic Trade Project, directed by the author and sponsored by the
Council on Foreign Relations. The writing of this aper was undertaken