Bedassa Tadesse

University of Minnesota Duluth | UMD · Department of Economics

Using annual data for China and 88 trading partners that span the period 1995–2011, we estimate whether cross-societal cultural differences influence China’s external trade flows. Our results, obtained from the estimation of a series of multi-level mixed effect random intercepts and coefficients models, indicate that China’s aggregate exports and i...

We examine the effects of immigrants and cross-societal cultural differences on bilateral trade costs using two alternative measures of cultural differences (i.e. cultural distance and genetic distance). We find that bilateral trade costs generally increase with a rise in the cultural distance between trading partners but fall with a rise in the st...

We use the first comprehensive estimates of bilateral trade costs to test the extensively stated, but rarely evaluated, hypothesis that immigrants reduce trade-related transaction costs. Our results provide robust and direct evidence supporting this often-posited hypothesis. We examine the period from 1995 through 2010 using data that represent 174...

Using data on stocks of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) from 131 countries spanning the years 1984 to 2004 and the number of products exported by each country, we examine the effect of FDI on horizontal export diversification. To quantify the effects, we utilize parametric (quantile) and semi-parametric econometric methods. Results from both approa...

This study investigates the effectiveness of gender-mainstreamed aid in mitigating gender inequality. We develop a robust theoretical model that accounts for the potential positive and perceived negative effects of shifts toward gender parity, capturing diverse societal perspectives. Utilizing a comprehensive dataset on aid activities focused on ge...

The African Growth Opportunity Act (AGOA) has been a crucial trade and development initiative, offering preferential access to qualified Sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries to the United States market since its enactment in 2000. This paper presents a comprehensive review of scholarly articles and policy reports that analyze the impact of AGOA on t...

Using comprehensive bilateral trade costs data and a new index of infrastructure spanning from the 2002–11 period, we (1) examine the impact of aid-for-trade (AFT) from bilateral (BLT) and multilateral (MLT) sources on trade costs facing AFT recipient countries and (2) identify the role that improvements in infrastructure may play on the effectiven...

Trade policy barriers and high transaction costs hinder developing countries from taking the full advantages of the global trading system. In order to help developing countries overcome the problem, the World Trade Organization (WTO) launched the Aid for Trade (AFT) initiatives in its Ministerial Conference held in Hong Kong in 2005. We examine the...

Using data on the levels of economic integration agreements (EIAs) among 172 countries (35 OECD members and 137 non-members) that span the years 1995–2009, we examine the effects of immigrants and EIA levels on bilateral trade costs between immigrants’ host and home countries and whether the influence of immigrants on trade costs varies across type...

Using the first comprehensive estimates of ad valorem tariff equivalent bilateral trade costs spanning the time period 2002–10, we examine whether the aid-for-trade (AFT) inflows reduce bilateral trade costs facing aid recipients. If so, we ask whether the trade costs reduction effects of AFT from bilateral and multilateral sources are complementar...

We highlight that an increase in the stock of immigrants corresponds with greater numbers of U.S. firms that engage in exporting to foreign markets. Our results are obtained from the estimation of a multi-level mixed effects model. Overall, the effect of immigrants is relatively larger among small- and medium-sized enterprises and is smaller among...

Using data from 85 NAICS 4 digit-level industry classifications that span the years 2004-2008, we evaluate whether productivity differentials, which have been shown to determine the decision of firms to export, affect the extensive margins of trade at the industry-level (i.e., the number of firms within an industry that engage in exporting). We use...

Employing data on the immigrant stocks of 43 African home nations who reside in 110 host nations and trade flows between these countries during the year 2005, we examine whether African immigrants exert positive effects on their home nations’ trade with the typical host nation. Estimation of Tobit regression models indicates a one percent increase...

That immigrants affect trade in goods between their home and host countries is well established in the literature. Little evidence exists, however, as to whether immigrants also affect trade in services. Using data on international tourist arrivals from 86 countries to the United States during the years 1995–2004, we provide the first empirical evi...

Using panel data that span from 1990 to 2005, the authors investigate the impact of tourism on the economic growth of 18 heterogeneous Latin American countries within the framework of the conventional neoclassical growth model. Results from the empirical models show that revenues from the tourism industry contribute positively to both the current l...

This paper empirically examines the extent to which the FDI – trade relationship is affected by host-country heterogeneities associated with the development (income) and market servicing roles of Japanese FDI host countries. Using the counts and values of Japanese aggregate FDI and trade flows into more than 100 geographically and developmentally d...

This essential volume examines the influence of immigrants on the process of international economic integration – specifically, their influences on bilateral and multilateral trade flows. It extends beyond the identification and explanation of the immigrant–trade link and offers a more expansive treatment of the subject matter, making it the most c...

A voluminous literature examines the immigrant-trade link. Available studies evaluate the link largely from the host country perspective and generally indicate that immigrants exert positive influences on trade between their host and home countries. Few studies, however, explore the effects of emigrants on trade. Using data representing the stocks...

Employing data on US immigrants and trade with 59 home countries for the years 1996-2001, we compare the extent to which refugee and non-refugee immigrants affect US trade with their home countries and provide the first evidence of variation in the US immigrant-trade relationship across immigrant types. We also consider the abilities of refugee and...

We examine the effect of cultural distance, a proxy for the lack of a minimum reservoir of trust necessary to initiate and complete trade deals, on bilateral trade flows. Employing data for 67 countries that span the years 1996–2001, we estimate a series of modified gravity specifications and find that cultural dissimilarity between nations has an...

We introduce 'cultural distance' as a measure of the degree to which shared norms and values in one country differ from those in another country, and employ a modified gravity specification to examine whether such cultural differences affect the volume of trade flows. Employing data for US state-level exports to the 75 trading partners for which me...

Employing data from nine OECD immigrant host countries and 67 trading partners for the years 1996-2001, we examine the inter-relationships between immigration, cultural diversity and trade. We find greater cultural differences between immigrants’ host and home countries inhibit trade flows. However, immigrants exert pro-trade influences that partia...

Employing data from nine OECD countries and 67 trading partners for the years 1996-2001, we examine the inter-relationships between immigration, cultural diversity and trade. We find greater cultural differences between immigrants’ host and home countries inhibit trade flows. However, immigrants exert pro-trade influences that partially offset the...

Employing a variant of the standard gravity equation and data from nine OECDimmigrant host countries and 67 trading partners for the years 1996-2001, we examinethe immigrant-trade relationship. Particular emphasis is placed on the potential influencesof host country cultural diversity and host-home cultural distance. Data from the WorldValues Surve...

By decomposing the changes in the real exchange rate series into fundamental and transitory components (market microstructure and stochastic element) and modeling the volatility in each via a GARCH process, this paper examines how volatility in exchange rate affects the volume of aggregate and disaggregate US trade with Canada, Germany, and Hong Ko...

Employing data for Italy and 68 trade partners that span the period 1996-2001, we examine the role of immigrants in influencing Italian exports to and imports from their respective home countries. Particular emphasis is placed on variation in the immigrant-trade relationship across Former Soviet Republic and Post-Communist country classifications r...

Since the 2001 Doha Round of multilateral trade negotiations, members of the World Trade Organization (WTO) have shown a renewed interest in using a new type of aid known as aid for trade (hereafter to be simply referred as AFT) as a means for catapulting the economic growth performance of developing countries. Japan, U.S., and the United Kingdom a...

We examine the effects of immigrants and cultural distance on US state-level exports, placing emphasis on the extent to which immigrants may offset the influence of cultural distance with respect to the initiation and intensification of exports. Our findings suggest that greater cultural differences between the US and immigrants’ home countries red...

We examine the relationships between immigrants, cultural distance and state-level exports, employing state-specific immigrant stocks and total US immigrant stocks, separately, and a measure of cultural distance recently introduced by [Tadesse, B., & White, R. (2008b). Cultural distance as a determinant of bilateral trade flows: Do immigrants count...

We evaluate the impact of the unilateral trade policy concession known as African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) on U.S. imports from eligible Sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries. Using U.S.-SSA countries' trade data that span the years 1991-2006, we find that AGOA has contributed to the initiation of new and the intensification of existing U.S....

Using data from the 2006 Social Capital Community Survey in Duluth, Minnesota, and Superior, Wisconsin, USA, we investigate associations between individual social capital measures (attitudes on trust, formal group involvement, informal socializing, organized group interaction, social support and volunteer activity) and self-rated health after contr...

Using data from the World and the European Values Surveys, we calculate cultural distances between the US and 54 immigrant home countries and examine the influences of cultural distance and immigrant populations on US imports from and exports to immigrants' home countries during the years 1997-2004. Our study indicates that, for both US imports and...

Using data from the 2006 Social Capital Community Survey in Duluth, Minnesota, and Superior, Wisconsin, USA, we investigate associations between individual social capital measures (attitudes on trust, formal group involvement, informal socializing, organized group interaction, social support and volunteer activity) and self-rated health after contr...

Migration flows are shaped by a complex combination of self-selection and out-selection mechanisms. In this paper, the authors analyze how existing diasporas (the stock of people born in a country and living in another one) affect the size and human-capital structure of current migration flows. The analysis exploits a bilateral data set on internat...

Over the decade of the 1990s, Africa has experienced a rise in tourist arrivals from 8.4 million to 10.6 million and receipts growth from $2.3 billion to $3.7 billion, respectively. According to the World Tourism Organization (WTO, 2006), the tourism industry in Sub-Saharan Africa enjoyed a robust annual market share growth rate of 10 percent in 20...

Examining data for Australia and 101 trading partners that span the years 1989-2000, we find immigrants from nations afforded preference under the White Australia policy exert greater proportional influences on Australian imports from their home countries compared to immigrants from nations not privy to such preference. Immigrants from this latter...

We evaluate the impact of the unilateral trade policy concession known as African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) on U.S. imports from eligible Sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries. Using U.S.-SSA countries’ trade data that span the years 1991-2006, we find that AGOA has contributed to the initiation of new and the intensification of existing U.S....

This paper examines how the industry-level FDI-export sales relationship is affected by the host nation’s status as an “export platform” (EP). Using Japanese FDI and export sales data into 35 host countries during the period 1989-1998 for 7 ISIC 2-digit industries, we find that the FDI-export sales relationship is industry-specific and sensitive to...

This paper empirically examines how a host nation's market characteristics, particularly its market maturity and role as an export platform, affect the amount of inward FDI it receives and its FDI - bilateral trade relationship with the FDI source. For the period 1989 - 1999, using Japanese outward FDI into 85 geographically and developmentally div...

Using cross-section data on urban households from Jimma city, Southwestern Ethiopia, in this paper we apply the economic theory of consumer choice and examine some endogenous household characteristics that affect the demand for children among urban households in Ethiopia. Based on parameter estimates derived from a count data model, we also simulat...

Despite the wider application of efficiency analysis in Indian agriculture, little has been done on the investigation of intra and interecological variations, size differences and their interactions. However, ecological issues have paramount implications for the low‐input sustainable agricultural production. Furthermore, due to the various causes o...

Despite the wider application of efficiency analysis in Indian agriculture, little has been done on the investigation of intra and interecological variations, size differences and their interactions. However, ecological issues have paramount implications for the low-input sustainable agricultural production. Furthermore, due to the various causes o...

Our study investigates the firm-and country-specific factors that affect the link between foreign direct investment (FDI) and trade. Specifically, we address the questions "do country-and firm-specific characteristics matter in Japanese FDI trade links?" and "do the counts and values of FDI that are often alternatively used in the empirical work co...

Using a sample selection induced bivariate probit m odel fitted to data collected from small scale, resource poor farmers in Western Oromia (Jimma, Ilu-Ababaor, Estern and Western Welega zones), I define and simu late different strategy (Pure and Mixed) scenarios. The scenarios provide the ext ent to which the adoption of maize technology package (...

use a count data model and the theory of consumer behavior to first identify some important socio-economic determinants of the demand for children. Then, we simulate the average number of children desired by a woman of median household characteristics and the extent to which an exogenously set population policy goal of lower fertility can be achiev...