IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/red/sed012/762.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Trade, Inventories, and International Business Cycles

Author

Listed:
  • Virgiliu Midrigan

    (New York University)

  • Joe Kaboski

    (University of Notre Dame)

  • George Alessandria

    (Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia)

Abstract

The large, persistent fluctuations in international trade that can not be explained in standard models by either changes in expenditures or relative prices are often attributed to trade wedges. We show that these trade wedges can reflect the decisions of importers to change their inventory holdings. We find that a two country model of international business cycles with an inventory management decision can generate trade flows and wedges consistent with the data. We find that modelling trade in this way alters the international transmission of business cycles. Specifically, real net exports become less procyclical and consumption becomes less correlated across countries.

Suggested Citation

  • Virgiliu Midrigan & Joe Kaboski & George Alessandria, 2012. "Trade, Inventories, and International Business Cycles," 2012 Meeting Papers 762, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    • Handle: RePEc:red:sed012:762
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://red-files-public.s3.amazonaws.com/meetpapers/2012/paper_762.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. George Alessandria & Horag Choi, 2007. "Do Sunk Costs of Exporting Matter for Net Export Dynamics?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 122(1), pages 289-336.
    2. Fabio Ghironi & Marc J. Melitz, 2005. "International Trade and Macroeconomic Dynamics with Heterogeneous Firms," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 120(3), pages 865-915.
    3. Andrei A. Levchenko & Logan Lewis & Linda L. Tesar, 2009. "The Collapse of International Trade During the 2008-2009 Crisis: In Search of the Smoking Gun," Working Papers 592, Research Seminar in International Economics, University of Michigan.
    4. Engel, Charles & Wang, Jian, 2011. "International trade in durable goods: Understanding volatility, cyclicality, and elasticities," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(1), pages 37-52, January.
    5. Aubhik Khan & Julia K. Thomas, 2007. "Inventories and the Business Cycle: An Equilibrium Analysis of ( S , s ) Policies," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(4), pages 1165-1188, September.
    6. Baxter, Marianne & Crucini, Mario J, 1995. "Business Cycles and the Asset Structure of Foreign Trade," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 36(4), pages 821-854, November.
    7. Costas Arkolakis & Ananth Ramanarayanan, 2009. "Vertical Specialization and International Business Cycle Synchronization," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 111(4), pages 655-680, December.
    8. Jonathan Eaton & Samuel Kortum & Brent Neiman & John Romalis, 2016. "Trade and the Global Recession," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(11), pages 3401-3438, November.
    9. Boileau, Martin, 1999. "Trade in capital goods and the volatility of net exports and the terms of trade," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(2), pages 347-365, August.
    10. Huang, Kevin X.D. & Liu, Zheng, 2007. "Business cycles with staggered prices and international trade in intermediate inputs," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(4), pages 1271-1289, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Iossifov, Plamen, 2014. "Cross-border production chains and business cycle co-movement between Central and Eastern European countries and euro area member states," Working Paper Series 1628, European Central Bank.
    2. Alessandria, George & Kaboski, Joseph & Midrigan, Virgiliu, 2013. "Trade wedges, inventories, and international business cycles," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(1), pages 1-20.
    3. Liao, Wei & Santacreu, Ana Maria, 2015. "The trade comovement puzzle and the margins of international trade," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(2), pages 266-288.
    4. Alberto Cavallo & Brent Neiman & Roberto Rigobon, 2014. "Currency Unions, Product Introductions, and the Real Exchange Rate," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 129(2), pages 529-595.
    5. George Alessandria & Joseph P. Kaboski & Virgiliu Midrigan, 2011. "US Trade and Inventory Dynamics," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(3), pages 303-307, May.
    6. Rudolfs Bems & Robert C. Johnson & Kei-Mu Yi, 2013. "The Great Trade Collapse," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 5(1), pages 375-400, May.
    7. George Alessandria, 2013. "The great trade collapse (and recovery)," Business Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, issue Q1, pages 1-10.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Alessandria, George & Kaboski, Joseph & Midrigan, Virgiliu, 2013. "Trade wedges, inventories, and international business cycles," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(1), pages 1-20.
    2. Jonathan Eaton & Samuel Kortum & Brent Neiman & John Romalis, 2016. "Trade and the Global Recession," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(11), pages 3401-3438, November.
    3. Benjamin Bridgman, 2013. "International Supply Chains And The Volatility Of Trade," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 51(4), pages 2110-2124, October.
    4. Leibovici, Fernando & Waugh, Michael E., 2019. "International trade and intertemporal substitution," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 158-174.
    5. Alessandria, George & Choi, Horag, 2021. "The dynamics of the U.S. trade balance and real exchange rate: The J curve and trade costs?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 132(C).
    6. Anna Watson, 2021. "Trade credit, trade income elasticity and the international transmission of shocks," Eurasian Economic Review, Springer;Eurasia Business and Economics Society, vol. 11(4), pages 687-733, December.
    7. Alessandria, George & Choi, Horag & Ruhl, Kim J., 2021. "Trade adjustment dynamics and the welfare gains from trade," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 131(C).
    8. Anna Watson, 2019. "Financial Frictions, the Great Trade Collapse and International Trade over the Business Cycle," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 30(1), pages 19-64, February.
    9. Virgiliu Midrigan & Joseph Kaboski & George Alessandria, 2010. "The Great Trade Collapse of 2008-09: An Inventory Adjustment?," 2010 Meeting Papers 107, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    10. George Alessandria & Joseph P. Kaboski & Virgiliu Midrigan, 2011. "US Trade and Inventory Dynamics," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(3), pages 303-307, May.
    11. Soojae Moon, 2015. "The Losses from Trade Restrictions: Policy Dynamics with Firm Selection and Endogenous Markup," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 23(1), pages 86-110, February.
    12. Paul Bergin & Ling Feng & Ching-Yi Lin, 2018. "Financial Frictions and Trade Dynamics," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 66(3), pages 480-526, September.
    13. Liao, Wei & Santacreu, Ana Maria, 2015. "The trade comovement puzzle and the margins of international trade," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(2), pages 266-288.
    14. Carter Mix, 2020. "Technology, Geography, and Trade over Time: The Dynamic Effects of Changing Trade Policy," International Finance Discussion Papers 1304, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    15. Rudolfs Bems & Robert C Johnson & Kei-Mu Yi, 2010. "Demand Spillovers and the Collapse of Trade in the Global Recession," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 58(2), pages 295-326, December.
    16. Chen, Natalie & Juvenal, Luciana, 2018. "Quality and the Great Trade Collapse," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 59-76.
    17. Andrea Raffo, 2008. "Technology Shocks: Novel Implications for International Business Cycles," 2008 Meeting Papers 511, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    18. Richard S. Grossman & Christopher M. Meissner, 2010. "International aspects of the Great Depression and the crisis of 2007: similarities, differences, and lessons," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 26(3), pages 318-338, Autumn.
    19. Borin, Alessandro & Di Nino, Virginia & Mancini, Michele & Sbracia, Massimo, 2016. "The Cyclicality of the Income Elasticity of Trade," MPRA Paper 73000, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Dennis Novy & Alan M. Taylor, 2020. "Trade and Uncertainty," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 102(4), pages 749-765, October.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:red:sed012:762. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Christian Zimmermann (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/sedddea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.