The objective of this paper is to provide indicators of trade restrictiveness that include both measures of tariff and nontariff barriers for 91 developing and industrial countries. For each country, the authors estimate three trade restrictiveness indices. The first one summarizes the degree of trade distortions that each country imposes on itself through its own trade policies. The second one focuses on the trade distortions imposed by each country on its import bundle. The last index focuses on market access and summarizes the trade distortions imposed by the rest of the world on each country's export bundle. All indices are estimated for the broad aggregates of manufacturing and agriculture products. Results suggest that poor countries (and those with the highest poverty headcount) tend to be more restrictive, but they also face the highest trade barriers on their export bundle. This is partly explained by the fact that agriculture protection is generally larger than manufacturing protection. Nontariff barriers contribute more than 70 percent on average to world protection, underlying their importance for any study on trade protection.

Studies of the impact of trade restrictiveness on growth, poverty, or unemployment are frequent in the academic literature. Few authors, however, provide a precise definition of what they mean by trade restrictiveness. When they do, the definition is unlikely to have tight links with trade theory. The objective of this article is to fill this gap by providing for 78 developing and developed countries clearly defined indicators of trade restrictiveness that are well grounded in trade theory. Results suggest that poor countries tend to have more restrictive trade policies but they also face higher trade barriers on their exports.

"To study the effects of tariffs on gross domestic product (GDP), one needs import demand elasticities at the tariff line level that are consistent with GDP maximization. These do not exist. Kee, Nicita, and Olarreaga modify Kohli's (1991) GDP function approach to estimate demand elasticities for 4,625 imported goods in 117 countries. Following Anderson and Neary (1992, 1994) and Feenstra (1995), they use these estimates to construct theoretically sound trade restrictiveness indices and GDP losses associated with existing tariff structures. Countries are revealed to be 30 percent more restrictive than their simple or import-weighted average tariffs would suggest. Thus, distortion is nontrivial. GDP losses are largest in China, Germany, India, Mexico, and the United States"--Abstract.

This paper provides evidence on monopolistic competition models with endogenous technology by studying the effects of sectoral export variety on country productivity. The effects are estimated in a translog GDP function system based on data for 34 countries from 1982 to 1997. Country productivity is constructed and export variety is shown to be significant. Instruments such as tariffs, transport costs, and distance are shown to affect country productivity through export variety, and only through this channel. Overall, while export variety accounts for only 2% of cross-country productivity differences, it explains 13% of within-country productivity growth. A 10% increase in the export variety of all industries leads to a 1.3% increase in country productivity, while a 10 percentage point increase in tariffs facing an exporting country leads to a 2% fall in country productivity.

The objective of this paper is to provide indicators of trade restrictiveness that include both measures of tariff and nontariff barriers for 91 developing and industrial countries. For each country, the authors estimate three trade restrictiveness indices. The first one summarizes the degree of trade distortions that each country imposes on itself through its own trade policies. The second one focuses on the trade distortions imposed by each country on its import bundle. The last index focuses on market access and summarizes the trade distortions imposed by the rest of the world on each country`s export bundle. All indices are estimated for the broad aggregates of manufacturing and agriculture products. Results suggest that poor countries (and those with the highest poverty headcount) tend to be more restrictive, but they also face the highest trade barriers on their export bundle. This is partly explained by the fact that agriculture protection is generally larger than manufacturing protection. Nontariff barriers contribute more than 70 percent on average to world protection, underlying their importance for any study on trade protection.

Studies the factors responsible for the secular decline of Singapore's unemployment rate over the period 1966-2000 in an environment of low and stable inflation rates.