International Economics

The World from the G-Econ Project	Population	The World at Night	Rotating Earth	The Visible Earth
Patterns of trade	GDP per capita	Foreign Direct Investment	X+M/GDP	Exports per capita
Scaled GDP map	Worldmapper	World wealth	Exports/imports	GDP maps
International Trade Statistics

Sources for the maps above:
Row 1: The rotating earth with GDP per capita is from the G-Econ Project , The population map is from Worldmapper, Sheffield Univerisity, UK , and the
satellite views of the world are from NASA's Visible Earth website.
Row 2: The patterns of trade, GDP per capita and FDI maps are from > UC Atlas of Global Inequality and the
Excel files for exports and imports as a share of GDP and exports per capita are from the WTO International Trade Statistics for 2003.
Row 3: Maps scaled by GDP or by exports and imports.
For the Worldmapper maps,

click on Wealth or Imports/Exports,
choose the first map
and scroll through the others by using the "Next Map" link at the top.

Syllabus -- Spring 2011

Problems from Pugel
Power Points from Pugel
Readings from the Mercantilists, Smith, Hume and Ricardo
Comparative Advantage and the Gains from Trade by Dr. McGahagan. Ricardian model of comparative advantage.
Practice Questions on Comparative Advantage ---- Answers
Studies of the Ricardian Trade Model
Leontief-Heckscher-Ohlin model
Specific Factors Model
Stolper-Samuelson: Trade and Wages
The Leontief Paradox
Review for the Midterm
Study Guide for Exam 2
Topics in International Finance
Sources for Final Paper
Assignment 1. Summary of Ben Bernanke, Global Economic Integration: What's New and What's Not? Speech at Jackson Hole Conference, Aug. 25, 2006.
A 3-4 page summary is due on Thursday, 13 January. See my Guidelines for Writing a Summary for my expectations for a summary.
Martin Wolf, In the grip of a great convergence , Financial Times , Jan. 4,2011 is a nice complement to the Bernanke speech. (Note that to use the Financial Times website, you must register. Registration is free; use your Pitt e-mail address)
Summary of Paul Krugman, A Country is Not a Company .
In the library, a rather more nicely formatted version is in the Harvard Business Review , Jan./Feb. 1996, p. 40ff. which you may prefer to Xerox, or access directly through Pittcat (works only from a University computer, not from home).

Competitiveness Paul Krugman, blog entry 22 Jan. 2011, referring to the upcoming State of the Union message as likely to center on the theme of competitiveness, which as Krugman previously pointed out, was A Dangerous Obsession
Summary of Paul Krugman, Ricardo's Difficult Idea.

The following material is from previous International Econonomics courses

News and items of interest
Topics for final trade paper April, 2010.
Topics in International Finance
Assignments and Readings -- Spring 2008-9
Midterm Exam Review, 2009
Final Exam Review, 2010
Introductory Tour of the World
Topics in International Trade
Trade Policy - Tariffs, Quotas, Dumping, Subsidies
Guide to Pugel text
Topics in International Finance
Articles and Working Papers
International economics datasets
Politics of Trade in Ohio by David Leonhardt. New York Times, 27 Feb. 2008.
Paul Krugman has written two of the best popular articles on the economics of international trade: Ricardo's Difficult Idea and A Country is Not a Company . Read them both and write a 3 page summary of one for Wednesday, January 23.
Trade and Wages, Reconsidered by Paul Krugman.
February 2008 draft of a paper for the Brookings Panel on Economic Activity.
NBER -- Trade and Investment
NBER -- Finance and Macroeconomics

International Trade Links -- Country Information

This page offers useful links for work on specific countries and regions.
Since Web sites are often reorganized, the general links (for example to the Word Trade Organization) are given as well as the specific links to country information (for example, to the WTO's Trade Policy Reviews). Try the specific links first, but don't be too surprised if they are broken.
If they are, please go to the web site's home page and see if you can find the link; if you do, drop me an e-mail with the new address.

References

Grimes' International Trade Links The country links are especially useful for our purposes.
Bernkopf's Central Banks Offers a list by country
Resources for Economists Goffe's list of links to economics sites on the internet. It has a useful list of international sites , especially for data.
Business and Economic Statistics (Am.Stat.Assoc.)

International Organizations

UNCTAD International Trade Center Excellent data on trade by country and category of goods; studies of revealed and potential comparative advantage. The most useful specific link is countries.htm ;use the small pull-down list at the top to select a country.
World Trade Organization Country Trade Policy Reviews are the most thorough source.
International Monetary Fund Staff research papers are often helpful; Standby Arrangements often discuss structural reforms. Check the Country Index
World Bank May be useful for developing countries, but focus is typically on individual projects rather than overall policy. You should check:
- Research
  There is a pull-down list for countries on the left;
  typing a country name into the SEARCH box will give too many hits which are often only slightly relevant.
- Country Index
- World Economic Forum for the Global Competitiveness Report, compiled by the World Bank and the World Economic Forum.
OECD The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development coordinates economic statistics and does regular surveys of the economies of its members. Especially useful is the section on the economy(pull down the "Topics" menu on the top of the home page and click on "Economy")and its Economic Outlook surveys.
International Labor Organization Relevant to this course is the breakdown of country labor forces by sector, which can be found in the labor statisitics offered by the ILO.
Note that "sectors" are defined in terms of the International Standard Industrial Classification and that the tables will show letters (for ISIC rev. 3) or numbers (for ISIC rev. 2), which can be decoded by clicking on the underlined ISIC in the table.

Country oriented links

McKinsey Consulting prepares reports on selected countries, which usually concentrate on productivity and comparative advantage. Requires (free) registration to access.
National Bureau of Economic Research Search on the Working Papers database, using the name of your country as a keyword. Chances are excellent that you will find useful papers.
Newspaper search using Pitt Library databases. Best procedure: Select National Newspapers , then limit your search to one newspaper by using the Publication Search feature. For example, if you select the letter W from the Publication Search screeen, you can choose to search the Wall Street Journal or the Washington Post . You have one further choice to make: select the Search Within Publication tab at the top, then enter your search terms. It may be a good idea to limit the date to the last 12 months for the first search.
Advanced Google Search . Using an ordinary Google search will almost surely result in a large number of not-very-useful links. To use the Google search engine efficiently:
1. Enter your country's name in the first line (with all the words).
2. Exact phrase: fill in
```
 "trade policy" 
```
  or another appropriately limited search term
3. File format: choose Adobe PDF to select documents someone has taken time to prepare.
4. Domain: fill in
```
 .edu 
```
  or
```
 .gov 
```
  to avoid a massive number of hits.
Then, of course, it is your job to browse through your hits for the truly useful links.
Country Studies/Area Handbooks by the Library of Congress provides detailed historical, political and economic background. Note that some of the country studies are a bit dated (oldest 1988), so check the publication date.
CountryWatch provides country overviews; full access only from University computers.
CIA World Factbook Brief encyclopedic survey, country by country.

US agencies

State Department Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs The most useful resources for our purposes are the Background reports for each country, and the Economic Policy and Trade Practices Reports which provide good starting points and general overviews; note that the surveys are organized by year, and the current year's surveys may not be available for each country.
State Department Country Commercial Guides Only to 1999 on this site; but very easy to find. The current Country Commercial Guides are at export.gov; but getting to them will require (free) registration.
International Trade Administration The ITA of the Department of Commerce is more of an informational than a policy making body; offers links to country information
U.S. Trade Representative The Executive Office in charge of trade negogiations. There is an index by regions .
The USTR also issues several useful reports , including the National Trade Estimate Report on Foreign Trade Barriers and the Trade Policy Agenda
International Trade Commission Plays a major role in trade disputes; maintains US tariff schedules and database of trade statistics.
The Treasury Department website is useful primarily for the Customs Service
Federal Reserve Board Information about foreign exchange market intervention is available in the Bulletin ; the International Finance Discussion Papers are worth checking.