Gains from trade: The Costa Rican case

Alonso Alfaro Ureña
Authors registered in the RePEc Author Service: Alonso Alfaro-Ureña

Revista de Ciencias Económicas, 2019, vol. 37, issue 2

Abstract: One of the oldest and most interesting questions in the economic literature is how to quantify the gains from trade. Recently, Costinot & Rodríguez-Clare (2014) (CRC) developed a methodology that uses the World Input Output Database (WIOD) to compute this value for a list of countries. Costa Rica has never been part of this database given the lack of appropriate data. However, with the publication of a new Input Output Table for Costa Rica, the Foreign Trade Ministry (COMEX) was able to develop a domestic version of the WIOD that includes the country. This paper presents the results of the CRC methodology using this version of the WIOD to compute gains from trade for the Costa Rican economy. Counterfactual exercises that compare the current situation with autarky and other average tariff levels using different productive structures and competition schemes in the economy are also presented. The results can provide valuable information on how much a small open economy like Costa Rica’s can benefit from international trade, and what are the differences in the results when compared to similar countries.

Keywords: GAINS FROM TRADE; COSTA RICA; INPUT-OUTPUT; GANANCIAS DEL COMERCIO; COSTA RICA; INSUMO-PRODUCTO (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://revistas.ucr.ac.cr/index.php/economicas/article/view/40031 (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:rce:rvceco:40031

Access Statistics for this article

Revista de Ciencias Económicas is currently edited by Fabricio Marín Rodríguez

More articles in Revista de Ciencias Económicas from Instituto de Investigaciones en Ciencias Económicas, Universidad de Costa Rica Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Luis J. Hall ().