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Optimal Tariffs: The Evidence

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Author Info
Christian Broda
Nuno Limão
David Weinstein

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Abstract

The theoretical debate over whether countries can and should set tariffs in response to the foreign export elasticities they face goes back to Edgeworth (1894). Despite the centrality of the optimal tariff argument in trade policy, there exists no evidence about whether countries actually exploit their market power in trade by setting higher tariffs on goods that are supplied inelastically. We estimate disaggregate foreign export supply elasticities and find evidence that countries that are not members of the World Trade Organization systematically set higher tariffs on goods that are supplied inelastically. The typical country in our sample sets tariffs 9 percentage points higher in goods with high market power relative to those with low market power. This large effect is of a magnitude similar to the average tariffs in the data and market power explains more of the tariff variation than a commonly used political economy variable. The result is robust to the inclusion of other determinants of tariffs and a variety of model specifications. We also find that U.S. trade restrictions that are not covered by the WTO are significantly higher in goods where the U.S. has more market power. In short, we find strong evidence that these importers have market power and use it in setting non-cooperative trade policy.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 12033.

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Date of creation: Feb 2006
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:12033

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
F13 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade Policy; International Trade Organizations
H21 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Efficiency; Optimal Taxation
F14 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Country and Industry Studies of Trade

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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Pol Antràs & Gerard Padró i Miquel, 2008. "Foreign Influence and Welfare," NBER Working Papers 14129, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  2. Dhingra, Swati, 2006. "Reconciling Observed Tariffs and the Median Voter Model," MPRA Paper 892, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 31 Jul 2007. [Downloadable!]
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