IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/eca/wpaper/2013-304059.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Globalization for Sale

Author

Listed:
  • Michael Blanga Gubbay
  • Paola Conconi
  • Mathieu Parenti

Abstract

We study the role of firms in the political economy of trade agreements. Using detailed information from lobbying reports filed under the Lobbying Disclosure Act, we find that virtually all firms that lobby on free trade agreements (FTAs) support their ratification. Moreover, relative to non-lobbying firms, lobbying firms are larger, and more likely to be engaged in international trade and to operate in comparative advantage sectors. To rationalize these findings, we develop a model in which heterogeneous firms decide whether to lobby and how much to spend in favor or against a proposed FTA. We show that the distributional effects are asymmetric: the winners from the FTA have higher stakes in the agreement than the losers, which explains why only pro-FTA firms select into lobbying. The model also delivers predictions on the intensive margin of lobbying. In line with these predictions, we find that firms spend more supporting agreements that generate larger potential gains in terms of the extent of the reduction of tariffs on their final goods and intermediate inputs, the depth of the agreement, and the export and sourcing potential of the FTA partners and when politicians are less likely to be in favor of ratification.

Suggested Citation

  • Michael Blanga Gubbay & Paola Conconi & Mathieu Parenti, 2020. "Globalization for Sale," Working Papers ECARES 2020-08, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
  • Handle: RePEc:eca:wpaper:2013/304059
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://dipot.ulb.ac.be/dspace/bitstream/2013/304059/3/2020-08-BLANGA_CONCONI_PARENTI-globalization.pdf
    File Function: Full text for the whole work, or for a work part
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Brander, James & Krugman, Paul, 1983. "A 'reciprocal dumping' model of international trade," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(3-4), pages 313-321, November.
    2. J. Peter Neary, 2016. "International Trade in General Oligopolistic Equilibrium," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 24(4), pages 669-698, September.
    3. Paola Conconi & Giovanni Facchini & Maurizio Zanardi, 2012. "Fast-Track Authority and International Trade Negotiations," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 4(3), pages 146-189, August.
    4. Laura Alfaro & Pol Antràs & Davin Chor & Paola Conconi, 2019. "Internalizing Global Value Chains: A Firm-Level Analysis," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 127(2), pages 508-559.
    5. Conconi, Paola & Facchini, Giovanni & Zanardi, Maurizio, 2014. "Policymakers' horizon and trade reforms: The protectionist effect of elections," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(1), pages 102-118.
    6. Melitz, Marc J. & Redding, Stephen J., 2014. "Heterogeneous Firms and Trade," Handbook of International Economics, in: Gopinath, G. & Helpman, . & Rogoff, K. (ed.), Handbook of International Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 0, pages 1-54, Elsevier.
    7. Cole, Matthew T. & Lake, James & Zissimos, Ben, 2021. "Contesting an international trade agreement," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 128(C).
    8. Marc J. Melitz & Giancarlo I. P. Ottaviano, 2021. "Market Size, Trade, and Productivity," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Firms and Workers in a Globalized World Larger Markets, Tougher Competition, chapter 4, pages 87-108, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    9. Tabakis, Chrysostomos & Zanardi, Maurizio, 2019. "Preferential trade agreements and antidumping protection," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 121(C).
    10. Chang, Pao-Li, 2005. "Protection for sale under monopolistic competition," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2), pages 509-526, July.
    11. Bombardini, Matilde & Trebbi, Francesco, 2012. "Competition and political organization: Together or alone in lobbying for trade policy?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(1), pages 18-26.
    12. Elhanan Helpman & Marc J. Melitz & Stephen R. Yeaple, 2004. "Export Versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(1), pages 300-316, March.
    13. Andrew Atkeson & Ariel Burstein, 2008. "Pricing-to-Market, Trade Costs, and International Relative Prices," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(5), pages 1998-2031, December.
    14. Grossman, Gene M & Helpman, Elhanan, 1994. "Protection for Sale," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(4), pages 833-850, September.
    15. Laura Alfaro & Paola Conconi & Harald Fadinger & Andrew F. Newman, 2016. "Do Prices Determine Vertical Integration?," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 83(3), pages 855-888.
    16. Pol Antràs & Teresa C. Fort & Felix Tintelnot, 2017. "The Margins of Global Sourcing: Theory and Evidence from US Firms," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(9), pages 2514-2564, September.
    17. Mary Amiti & Jozef Konings, 2007. "Trade Liberalization, Intermediate Inputs, and Productivity: Evidence from Indonesia," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(5), pages 1611-1638, December.
    18. Laurent Bouton & Micael Castanheira & Allan Drazen, 2024. "A Theory of Small Campaign Contributions," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 134(662), pages 2351-2390.
    19. Ron Siegel, 2010. "Asymmetric Contests with Conditional Investments," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(5), pages 2230-2260, December.
    20. Chase, Kerry A., 2003. "Economic Interests and Regional Trading Arrangements: The Case of NAFTA," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 57(1), pages 137-174, January.
    21. Jia, Hao & Skaperdas, Stergios & Vaidya, Samarth, 2013. "Contest functions: Theoretical foundations and issues in estimation," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 31(3), pages 211-222.
    22. Ken-Ichi Shimomura & Jacques-François Thisse, 2012. "Competition among the big and the small," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 43(2), pages 329-347, June.
    23. Giovanni Maggi & Pinelopi Koujianou Goldberg, 1999. "Protection for Sale: An Empirical Investigation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(5), pages 1135-1155, December.
    24. Laurent Bouton & Micael Castanheira & Allan Drazen, 2024. "A Theory of Small Campaign Contributions," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 134(662), pages 2351-2390.
    25. Paola Conconi & Manuel García-Santana & Laura Puccio & Roberto Venturini, 2018. "From Final Goods to Inputs: The Protectionist Effect of Rules of Origin," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(8), pages 2335-2365, August.
    26. Joaquin Blaum & Claire Lelarge & Michael Peters, 2018. "The Gains from Input Trade with Heterogeneous Importers," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 10(4), pages 77-127, October.
    27. Cecile Gaubert & Oleg Itskhoki, 2021. "Granular Comparative Advantage," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 129(3), pages 871-939.
    28. Bernard, Andrew B. & Bradford Jensen, J., 1999. "Exceptional exporter performance: cause, effect, or both?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(1), pages 1-25, February.
    29. Joaquin Blaum & Claire LeLarge & Michael Peters, 2015. "The Gains from Input Trade in Firm-Based Models of Importing," NBER Working Papers 21504, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    30. Devashish Mitra, 2016. "Endogenous Lobby Formation and Endogenous Protection: A Long-Run Model of Trade Policy Determination," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: The Political Economy of Trade Policy Theory, Evidence and Applications, chapter 1, pages 3-21, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    31. Marianne Bertrand & Matilde Bombardini & Francesco Trebbi, 2014. "Is It Whom You Know or What You Know? An Empirical Assessment of the Lobbying Process," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(12), pages 3885-3920, December.
    32. Magdalene Silberberger & Frederik Stender, 2018. "False friends? Empirical evidence on trade policy substitution in regional trade agreements," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(8), pages 2175-2199, August.
    33. Pinelopi Koujianou Goldberg & Amit Kumar Khandelwal & Nina Pavcnik & Petia Topalova, 2010. "Imported Intermediate Inputs and Domestic Product Growth: Evidence from India," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 125(4), pages 1727-1767.
    34. Avinash Dixit, 2008. "Strategic Behavior in Contests," Springer Books, in: Roger D. Congleton & Arye L. Hillman & Kai A. Konrad (ed.), 40 Years of Research on Rent Seeking 1, pages 431-438, Springer.
    35. Paula Bustos, 2011. "Trade Liberalization, Exports, and Technology Upgrading: Evidence on the Impact of MERCOSUR on Argentinian Firms," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(1), pages 304-340, February.
    36. Gary S. Becker, 1983. "A Theory of Competition Among Pressure Groups for Political Influence," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 98(3), pages 371-400.
    37. Baldwin, Robert E & Magee, Christopher S, 2000. "Is Trade Policy for Sale? Congressional Voting on Recent Trade Bills," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 105(1-2), pages 79-101, October.
    38. Bombardini, Matilde, 2008. "Firm heterogeneity and lobby participation," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(2), pages 329-348, July.
    39. Dani Rodrik, 2018. "What Do Trade Agreements Really Do?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 32(2), pages 73-90, Spring.
    40. Laura Alfaro & Paola Conconi & Harald Fadinger & Andrew F. Newman, 2016. "Do Prices Determine Vertical Integration?," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, pages 855-888.
    41. Andreas Dür & Leonardo Baccini & Manfred Elsig, 2014. "The design of international trade agreements: Introducing a new dataset," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 9(3), pages 353-375, September.
    42. Volker Nocke & Nicolas Schutz, 2018. "Multiproduct‐Firm Oligopoly: An Aggregative Games Approach," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 86(2), pages 523-557, March.
    43. Dür, Andreas & Baccini, Leonardo & Elsig, Manfred, 2014. "The design of international trade agreements: introducing a new dataset," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 59179, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    44. Baldwin, Richard, 2011. "21st century regionalism: Filling the gap between 21st century trade and 20th century trade rules," WTO Staff Working Papers ERSD-2011-08, World Trade Organization (WTO), Economic Research and Statistics Division.
    45. Emanuel Ornelas, 2005. "Rent Destruction and the Political Viability of Free Trade Agreements," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 120(4), pages 1475-1506.
    46. Esteban, Joan & Ray, Debraj, 2001. "Collective Action and the Group Size Paradox," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 95(3), pages 663-672, September.
    47. Marc J. Melitz, 2003. "The Impact of Trade on Intra-Industry Reallocations and Aggregate Industry Productivity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 71(6), pages 1695-1725, November.
    48. Karam Kang, 2016. "Policy Influence and Private Returns from Lobbying in the Energy Sector," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 83(1), pages 269-305.
    49. Gopinath, G. & Helpman, . & Rogoff, K. (ed.), 2014. "Handbook of International Economics," Handbook of International Economics, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 4, number 4.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Sonali Chowdhry & Gabriel Felbermayr, 2023. "Trade liberalization along the firm size distribution: The case of the EU‐South Korea FTA," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(5), pages 1751-1792, November.
    2. Lyu, Jianxing & Prehn, Soren & Zhang, Yanjie & Glauben, Thomas & Zeng, Yinchu, 2021. "Trade creation, political sensitivity and product exclusions: the political economy of agriculture protection in China’s FTAs," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 63(03), January.
    3. Vincent Rebeyrol, 2023. "Protection Without Discrimination," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 133(655), pages 2807-2827.
    4. Ross Jestrab, 2021. "The effects of domestic labour mobility on trade agreements: Empirical evidence," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(8), pages 2238-2283, August.
    5. Martin Braml, 2020. "Beggar-thy-Neighbor or Favor thy Industry? An Empirical Review of Transatlantic Tariff Retaliation," ifo Working Paper Series 326, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Conconi, Paola & Blanga-Gubbay, Michael & Parenti, Mathieu, 2020. "Lobbying for Globalization," CEPR Discussion Papers 14597, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    2. Crinò, Rosario & Bonfiglioli, Alessandra & Gancia, Gino, 2021. "International Trade with Heterogeneous Firms: Theory and Evidence," CEPR Discussion Papers 16249, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    3. Andrew B. Bernard & J. Bradford Jensen & Stephen J. Redding & Peter K. Schott, 2018. "Global Firms," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 56(2), pages 565-619, June.
    4. Chad Brown & Paola Conconi & Aksel Erbahar & Lorenzo Trimarchi, 2020. "Trade Protection Along Supply Chains," Working Papers ECARES 2020-52, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    5. Pol Antràs & Davin Chor, 2021. "Global Value Chains," NBER Working Papers 28549, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Huang, Hanwei & Manova, Kalina & Perelló, Oscar & Pisch, Frank, 2024. "Firm Heterogeneity and Imperfect Competition in Global Production Networks," CEPR Discussion Papers 19408, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    7. Paola Conconi & Manuel García-Santana & Laura Puccio & Roberto Venturini, 2018. "From Final Goods to Inputs: The Protectionist Effect of Rules of Origin," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(8), pages 2335-2365, August.
    8. Cole, Matthew T. & Lake, James & Zissimos, Ben, 2021. "Contesting an international trade agreement," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 128(C).
    9. Arnaud Costinot & Andrés Rodríguez‐Clare & Iván Werning, 2020. "Micro to Macro: Optimal Trade Policy With Firm Heterogeneity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 88(6), pages 2739-2776, November.
    10. Mrázová, Monika & Neary, J. Peter, 2020. "IO for exports(s)," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    11. Melitz, Marc J. & Redding, Stephen J., 2014. "Heterogeneous Firms and Trade," Handbook of International Economics, in: Gopinath, G. & Helpman, . & Rogoff, K. (ed.), Handbook of International Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 0, pages 1-54, Elsevier.
    12. Yuting Gao, 2022. "Lobbying for Trade Liberalization and its Policy Influence," CAEPR Working Papers 2022-006 Classification-D, Center for Applied Economics and Policy Research, Department of Economics, Indiana University Bloomington.
    13. Lake, James, 2015. "Revisiting the link between PAC contributions and lobbying expenditures," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 86-101.
    14. Uysal, Pinar & Yotov, Yoto V. & Zylkin, Thomas, 2015. "Firm heterogeneity and trade-induced layoffs: An empirical investigation," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 80-97.
    15. Laura Alfaro & Alejandro Cuñat & Harald Fadinger & Yanping Liu, 2017. "The Real Exchange Rate, Innovation and Asymmetries and Hysteresis," Harvard Business School Working Papers 18-044, Harvard Business School, revised May 2018.
    16. Ramanarayanan, Ananth, 2020. "Imported inputs and the gains from trade," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(C).
    17. Pavcnik, Nina & Goldberg, Pinelopi, 2016. "The Effects of Trade Policy," CEPR Discussion Papers 11104, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    18. Alfaro, Laura & Cunat, Alejandro & Liu, Yanping & Fadinger, Harald, 2018. "The real exchange rate, innovation and productivity : regional heterogeneity, asymmetries and hysteresis," Working Papers 18-05, University of Mannheim, Department of Economics.
    19. Paola Conconi & Glenn Magerman & Afrola Plaku, 2020. "The Gravity of Intermediate Goods," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 57(2), pages 223-243, September.
    20. Bombardini, Matilde & Trebbi, Francesco, 2012. "Competition and political organization: Together or alone in lobbying for trade policy?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(1), pages 18-26.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Trade agreements; endogeneous lobbying; heterogeneous firms;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F13 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade Policy; International Trade Organizations
    • F53 - International Economics - - International Relations, National Security, and International Political Economy - - - International Agreements and Observance; International Organizations
    • F61 - International Economics - - Economic Impacts of Globalization - - - Microeconomic Impacts

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eca:wpaper:2013/304059. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Benoit Pauwels (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/arulbbe.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.