Search Results
Working Paper
Cross-border Patenting, Globalization, and Development
We build a stylized model that captures the relationships between cross-border patenting, globalization, and development. Our theory delivers a gravity equation for cross-border patents. To test the model’s predictions, we compile a new dataset that tracks patents within and between countries and industries, for 1980-2019. The econometric analysis reveals a strong, positive impact of policy and globalization on cross-border patent flows, especially from North to South. A counterfactual welfare analysis suggests that the increase in patent flows from North to South has benefited both ...
Working Paper
Cross-border Patenting and the Margins of International Trade
This paper investigates the impact of cross-border patenting on the margins of international trade using disaggregated data on international patenting and trade flows. We develop a theoretical framework of trade and firms' patenting decisions that motivates our empirical analysis. The main results reveal that cross-border patenting has a larger effect on the extensive margin of trade compared to the intensive margin. This finding suggests that firms tend to seek patent protection in international markets prior to entering those markets with new products, rather than with their existing ...
Working Paper
Cross-border Patenting, Globalization, and Development
We build a quantitative model that captures the relationships between cross-border patenting, globalization, and development. Our theory delivers a ‘structural gravity’ equation for cross-border patents. To test the model’s predictions, we compile a new dataset that tracks patents within and between countries and industries over time. The econometric analysis reveals a strong, positive impact of policy and globalization on cross-border patent flows between 1995 and 2018, especially from North to South. A counterfactual analysis shows these North-to-South flows benefited both regions, ...
Working Paper
The Micro and Macro Dynamics of Capital Flows
We study empirically and theoretically the effects of international financial flows on resource allocation. Using the universe of firms in Hungary, we show that removing capital controls lowers firms’ cost of capital and increases household consumption, with the latter playing a dominant role. The consumption channel leads to reallocation of resources toward high expenditure elasticity activities—such as services—promoting both the expansion of incumbents and firm entry. A multi-sector heterogeneous firm model replicates these dynamics. Our model shows that non-homotheticity in ...
Working Paper
Technology, Geopolitics, and Trade
We study how geopolitical shocks reshape innovation through the contractual structure of cross-border technology adoption. Empirically, royalty flows are more sensitive than goods trade to geopolitical distance, especially where intellectual property enforcement is weak. We build a growth-trade model in which political risk raises breach hazards in licensing contracts. Firms reprice royalties but compliant adoption declines, and innovation incentives respond to the joint evolution of price and quantity. Quantitatively, fragmentation reallocates innovation and lowers the balanced-growth path ...
Report
Africa is on time
We present evidence that the recent African growth renaissance has reached Africa?s poor. Using survey data on African income distributions and national accounts GDP, we estimate income distributions, poverty rates, and inequality indices for African countries for the period 1990-2011. Our findings are as follows. First, African poverty is falling rapidly. Second, the African countries for which good inequality data exist are set to reach the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) poverty reduction target on time. The entire continent except for the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) will reach ...
Working Paper
Technology, Geopolitics, and Trade
We study when unilateral export controls are optimal by quantifying how geopolitical rivalry reshapes trade in ideas. Empirically, cross-border technology flows are far more sensitive than goods trade to geopolitical distance, especially where IPR is weak, and these penalties intensify after 2017. Motivated by this evidence, we build a growth–trade model in which geopolitical distance raises breach risk in licensing; firms partially reprice risk via higher royalties but cannot fully insure quantities. In a consumption-only benchmark, a permanent rise in US–China geopolitical distance ...
Working Paper
Cross-border Patenting, Globalization, and Development
We build a stylized model that captures the relationships between cross-border patenting, globalization, and development. Our theory delivers a gravity equation for cross-border patents. To test the model’s predictions, we compile a new dataset that tracks patents within and between countries and industries, for 1980-2019. The econometric analysis reveals a strong, positive impact of policy and globalization on cross-border patent flows, especially from North to South. A counterfactual welfare analysis suggests that the increase in patent flows from North to South has benefited both ...
Working Paper
Technology, Geopolitics, and Trade
We study when unilateral export controls are optimal by quantifying how geopolitical rivalry reshapes trade in ideas. Empirically, cross-border technology flows are far more sensitive than goods trade to geopolitical distance, especially where IPR is weak, and these penalties intensify after 2017. Motivated by this evidence, we build a growth–trade model in which geopolitical distance raises breach risk in licensing; firms partially reprice risk via higher royalties but cannot fully insure quantities. In a consumption-only benchmark, a permanent rise in US–China geopolitical distance ...
Working Paper
The Effect of Export Market Access on Labor Market Power: Firm-level Evidence from Vietnam
We examine the impact of an export market expansion created by the US-Vietnam Bilateral Trade Agreement (BTA) on labor market competition among Vietnamese manufacturing firms. We measure distortionary wedges between equilibrium marginal revenue products of labor (MRPL) and wages nonparametrically and find that the median firm pays workers 59% of their MRPL. The BTA permanently decreases labor market distortion in manufacturing by 3.4%, mainly for domestic private firms. The median distortion is 26% higher for women than men, and the decline in distortion for women drives the overall ...