The Effects of Competitiveness on Trade Balance: The Case of Southern Europe
Küçük Resim Yok
Tarih
2016
Yazarlar
Dergi Başlığı
Dergi ISSN
Cilt Başlığı
Yayıncı
Walter De Gruyter Gmbh
Erişim Hakkı
info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
Özet
According to conventional wisdom, peripheral Southern European members of the euro area (Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain) suffer from a problem of competitiveness. Since their membership of the euro area renders devaluation impossible, adjustment should come through decreasing wages and prices in these countries, which, by improving the trade balance, should lead to a recovery of previous levels of employment and growth. In this paper, the authors estimate trade balance equations for the Southern European countries, both for total trade and for the trade performed with the European Union, taking three alternative measures of the real exchange rate, based on consumption price indices, export prices and unit labour costs, respectively. Their main conclusion is that demand seems to be more relevant than relative prices when explaining the evolution of the trade balance.
Açıklama
Anahtar Kelimeler
Trade balance, real exchange rate, competitiveness
Kaynak
Economics-The Open Access Open-Assessment E-Journal
WoS Q Değeri
Q4
Scopus Q Değeri
Q2
Cilt
10