Do Customs Union Members Engage In More Bilateral Trade Than Free Trade Agreement Members?
) (SMU) Abstract This paper provides the first empirical analysis directly comparing the effects of customs unions (CUs) and free trade agreements (FTAs) on members’ bilateral trade, while addressing the biases arising from log-linearization of the gravity model and crucial time-invariant unobservables. Since Fiorentino et al. (2007) question the popularity of CUs relative to FTAs, considering the latter to be more practical in the current trading climate, such a comparison seems especially relevant. While Baier and Bergstrand (2007) find an FTA to approximately double membersí bilateral trade after 10 years, it is actually a CU, and not an FTA, which doubles bilateral trade. Download InfoTo download: If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. Information about this may be contained in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please b
