The impact of container shipping costs on import and consumer prices

Elena Rusticelli and Catherine MacLeod

No 1838, OECD Economics Department Working Papers from OECD Publishing

Abstract: Container shipping prices have experienced remarkable volatility, having risen substantially following Red Sea shipping disruptions, fallen with rising global supply and fluctuated in response to trade policy changes. We build on the existing literature by estimating the pass-through of container goods shipping costs into imported manufactured goods, excluding imported commodities, where the relationship with shipping cost pass-through is complicated by energy prices. We find that the impact of container shipping inflation on import price inflation and core inflation is smaller when commodity imports are excluded. Despite the smaller estimates of pass-through, container shipping cost shocks remain relevant for policy makers to consider, given continued very large price shocks. The results are robust to controls for supply shortages and shipping market conditions.

Keywords: commodities; Container shipping costs; import prices; manufactured goods; pass-through (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C23 E31 F17 F62 L16 R41 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025-08-05
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oec:ecoaaa:1838-en

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