Impact of Restrictive Trade Policy on Adult Unemployment, Welfare and the Incidence of Child Labour -A Three Sector General Equilibrium Analysis

Runa Ray () and Biswajit Chatterjee ()
Additional contact information
Runa Ray: Department of Economics, Jadavpur University, Calcutta –700032
Biswajit Chatterjee: Planning and Development Unit, Jadavpur University, Calcutta –700032

Journal of Quantitative Economics, 2010, vol. 8, issue 1, 148-161

Abstract: This paper considers a three sector competitive general equilibrium model of a small open, less developed economy suffering from unemployment problem in the adult labour market on the one hand, and from the existence of employment of child labour on the other . The economy is divided into one rural, and two urban sub-sectors. Four inputs are used in the model among which three are – sector specific in nature. The representative adult worker in this model not only supplies his own labour ,but also sends his children out to work. Factor market distortion in this model is captured by the existence of a factor price differential between urban and rural sectors. The model is used to analyze the effect of imposition of tariff protection in import competing sector on the unemployment of adult workers on the one hand , and on the incidence of child labour supply on the other. An interesting result of the present exercise is that the supply of child labour moves in the opposite direction to the level of unemployment in the adult labour market as the tariff rate protection in import competing sector changes. This result runs counter to the existing view that unemployment in the adult labour market is one of the important causes for the existence of child labour market.

Keywords: Child labour; General equilibrium; Urban adult unemployment; Trade policy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F10 J13 J22 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2010
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.jqe.co.in/journals/JQE_v8_n1_2010_p10.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
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:jqe:jqenew:v:8:y:2010:i:1:p:148-161

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
Managing Editor, Journal of Quantitative Economics, Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research (IGIDR), Gen. A.K. Vaidya Marg, Goregaon (E), Mumbai 400 065 , INDIA
http://www.jqe.co.in/

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Quantitative Economics is currently edited by A. L. Nagar (Editor-in-Chief), D. M. Nachane (Managing-Editor) and G. Mythili (Joint Managing Editor)

More articles in Journal of Quantitative Economics from The Indian Econometric Society Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by D. M. Nachane () and ().