Ariel Burstein

Trade, production sharing, and the international transmission of business cycles ☆

Abstract Countries that are more engaged in production sharing exhibit higher bilateral manufacturing output correlations. We use data on trade flows between US multinationals and their affiliates as well as trade between the United States and Mexican maquiladoras to measure production-sharing trade and its link with the business cycle. We then develop a quantitative model of international business cycles that generates a positive link between the extent of vertically integrated production-sharing trade and internationally synchronized business cycles. A key assumption in the model is a relatively low elasticity of substitution between home and foreign inputs in the production of the vertically integrated good.

International Prices and Exchange Rates

We survey the recent empirical and theoretical developments in the literature on the relation between prices and exchange rates. After updating some of the major findings in the empirical literature, we present a simple framework to interpret this evidence. We review theoretical models that generate insensitivity of prices to exchange rate changes through variable markups, both under flexible prices and nominal rigidities, first in partial equilibrium and then in general equilibrium.

International Trade, Technology, and the Skill Premium

What are the consequences of international trade on the skill premium? We incorporate skill-intensity differences across firms and sectors into a standard model of international trade. Reductions in trade costs reallocate factors toward a countrys comparative advantage sectors, increasing the skill premium in countries with a comparative advantage in skill-intensive sectors and decreasing it elsewhere. Reductions in trade costs also reallocate factors toward more productive and skill-intensive firms within sectors and toward skill-intensive sectors in all countries, increasing the skill premium in all countries. Quantitatively, we find that trade liberalization increases the skill premium in almost all countries.

Investment Prices and Exchange Rates: Some Basic Facts

This paper documents four basic facts about investment goods and investment prices. First, investment has a very significant nontradable component in the form of construction services. Second, distributions services (wholesaling, retailing, and transportation) are much less important for investment than for consumption. Third, the import content of investment is much larger than that of consumption. Finally, in the aftermath of three large devaluations, the rate of exchange rate pass-through is, perhaps not surprisingly, highest for imported equipment and lowest for construction services. (JEL: F41) Copyright (c) 2004 The European Economic Association.