Agricultural Comparative Advantage andLegislators' Support for Trade Agreements

Giorgio Chiovelli, Francesco Amodio, Leonardo Baccini and Michele Di Maio

No 2002, Documentos de Trabajo/Working Papers from Facultad de Ciencias Empresariales y Economia. Universidad de Montevideo.

Abstract: Does comparative advantage explain legislators' support for trade liberalization? We use data onpotential crop yields as determined by weather and soil characteristics to derive a new, plausiblyexogenous measure of comparative advantage in agriculture for each district in the US. Evidenceshows that comparative advantage in agriculture predicts how legislators vote on the ratificationof preferential trade agreements in Congress. We show that legislators in districts with highagricultural comparative advantage are more likely to mention that trade agreements are goodfor agriculture in House floor debates preceding roll-call votes on their ratifications. Individualsliving in the same districts are also more likely to support free trade. Our analysis and resultscontribute to the literature on the political economy of trade and its distributional consequences,and to our understanding of the economic determinants of legislators voting decisions.

Keywords: Trade; Agricultural; Political Economy; Trade Agreements (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-agr, nep-int and nep-pol
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Working Paper: Agricultural Comparative Advantage and Legislators’ Support for Trade Agreements (2020)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:mnt:wpaper:2002

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