Did US Safeguards Resuscitate Harley-Davidson in the 1980s?

Taiju Kitano and Hiroshi Ohashi
Additional contact information
Taiju Kitano: National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies

No CIRJE-F-612, CIRJE F-Series from CIRJE, Faculty of Economics, University of Tokyo

Abstract: This paper examines US safeguards applied to the motorcycle market in the 1980s. After receiving temporary protection by means of a maximum tariff of over 45%, Harley-Davidson sales recovered dramatically. Simulations, based on structural demand and supply estimates, indicate that while safeguard tariffs did benefit Harley-Davidson, they only account for a fraction of its increased sales. This is primarily because consumers perceived that Harley-Davidson and Japanese large motorcycles were poorly matched substitutes for each other. Our results provide little evidence that safeguard provisions triggered restructuring in Harley-Davidson.

Pages: 30 pages
Date: 2009-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-his, nep-lab and nep-mkt
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.cirje.e.u-tokyo.ac.jp/research/dp/2009/2009cf612.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Did US safeguards resuscitate Harley-Davidson in the 1980s? (2009)
Working Paper: Did U.S. Safeguard Resuscitate Harley Davidson in the 1980s? (2007)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:tky:fseres:2009cf612

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in CIRJE F-Series from CIRJE, Faculty of Economics, University of Tokyo Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CIRJE administrative office ().