Search results for "Barrier"
showing 10 items of 678 documents
Sub‐regional integration in the MENA region and the euro‐mediterranean free trade area
1999
The creation of a new Euro‐Mediterranean region in which to build a shared prosperity area requires existing North‐South economic integration to be complemented by South‐South trade liberalization. Trade links among the southern and eastern Mediterranean countries have remained at a very low level. There is room for greater commercial integration, although the scope for an increase in intra‐regional trade volume is limited. Trade liberalization could lead to a relocation of resources according to comparative advantage and to the growth of intra‐industry trade. However, some economic instruments are required both in order to allay political fears and in order to upgrade transport, communicat…
Simultaneity between strategic variables: Production, innovation, and product differentiation
1995
This paper aims to analyze the existence of simultaneous effects among the variables production, product differentiation, and innovation. Microeconomic data from a sample of 2,160 firms are used as a base. Empirical results show that a positive correlation exists from innovation to product differentiation, thus showing that it is in the process of production itself, through technical improvements, where product differentiation is determined. On the other hand, no positive effect exists from product differentiation to innovation, i.e., once technical improvements have been established, firms exchange the barriers to entry created by brand image for the real barriers established by innovation…
Competitiveness and interregional as well as international trade: The case of Catalonia
2010
Recent years have seen a surge of interest among industrial organization economists in using data on international trade flows as windows into competitiveness. For countries that are at least mid sized (e g., Spain), interregional trade tends to be as large as or significantly larger than international trade. The case of Catalonia, a Spanish region, illustrates how ignoring interregional flows can lead to erroneous inferences about a region's external competitiveness. Accounting for Catalonia's interregional as well as international flows shifts what is generally assessed to be a chronic trade deficit in goods into a surplus and changes diagnoses of which Catalan sectors generate external s…
Trade effects of monetary agreements: Evidence for OECD countries
2008
Abstract This paper analyses the effects of monetary agreements on trade flows using a sample of 25 OECD countries over the period 1950–2004. We find that these agreements have boosted intra-bloc trade. This result especially applies to the case of the euro. More importantly, in contrast to regional trade agreements, all monetary agreements analysed show evidence of trade-creating effects with third countries. Finally, only the euro shows a symmetric impact for the trade-creating effect with non-members, that is, using the euro promotes both the Eurozone's exports and its imports to non-Eurozone markets to a similar extent.
Do foreign workers reduce trade barriers? Microeconomic evidence
2015
This paper provides evidence that foreign workers reduce firms' trade costs and thus increase the probability that firms export. This informs both the literature on trade costs and the microeconomic literature on firms' export behaviour. We identify the nationality of each worker in a large sample of German establishments, and relate this to the exporting behaviour of these establishments. We allow for the possible endogeneity of an establishment's workforce by instrumenting the share of foreign workers with the regional distribution of foreign workers in the wider labour market. We find a significant effect of worker nationality on exporting which is not driven by the industrial, occupatio…
Market must be defended: The role of counter-espionage policy in protecting domestic market welfare
2022
Governments of advanced economies are extremely concerned about the illicit acquisition of information on critical technologies employed by their industries, and countering this economic espionage is quickly becoming one of their top priorities. The present paper advances the theoretical analysis of the interaction between economic espionage and counter-espionage, and presents a first approximation to an inquiry into the rationale for the influence of market competition in its dynamics. The proposed model assumes a country with a one-market economy open to international trade whose product is supplied by domestic firms. Moreover, successful economic espionage implying market entry of foreig…
The effect of hydration layers on the anodic growth and on the dielectric properties of Al2O3 for electrolytic capacitors
2014
Hydrous films were grown on high purity and cubicity Al foils for electrolytic capacitors in deionized water, ethylene glycol - deionized water and in glycerol - deionized water for different immersion times. According to the X-ray diffraction patterns the hydration treatment allowed to grow a pseudo boehmite layer on Al surface whose morphology is appreciably affected by the bath composition. Capacitance measurements and photoelectrochemical findings suggest that a more compact barrier layer forms during the immersion in alcohol containing solutions. The hydration in water allowed to save energy and to prepare more blocking oxide films. The beneficial effect of hydration in hot water on th…
Ab Initio Calculations of the Transfer and Aggregation of F Centers in CaF2
2012
The F center and R center in CaF2 crystals have been studied by using density functional theory (DFT) with a hybrid B3PW description of exchange and correlation. Our calculations show that the F-center diffusion barrier is equal to 1.67 eV. During the F-center transfer, the trapped electron is more delocalized than that in the regular F-center case, and the gap between defect level and CB in the α-spin state decreases. The surface F-center investigation shows the trend of F centers to locate near the surface. The association energy calculations of R centers indicate stable aggregations of isolated F centers. During the F-center aggregation, a considerable covalency forms between two neighbo…
The Antecedents of Customer Loyalty - Results of an Empirical Study in the Automotive Industry
2015
Customer satisfaction is regarded as the key to customer loyalty in the automotive industry. However, this relationship is influenced by several other variables, like switching barriers or variety seeking. This paper provides a structural equation model with latent variables for modeling this complex relationship. According to literature, high satisfaction should lead to loyalty but is heavily affected by moderating variables. An empricial study is reported which supports these predictions as well as the arguments on which they are based.
Ethanol reduces zincosome formation in cultured astrocytes.
2010
Aims Zinc is an ion that participates in basic cellular and tissular functions. Zinc deficiency is present in many physiological and health problems affecting most body organs, including the brain. Among the circumstances involved in zinc deficiency, ethanol consumption is probably one of the most frequent. A dietary zinc supplement has been proposed as possibly being an efficient method to palliate zinc deficiency. Astrocytes form part of the hematoencephalic barrier, and they are apparently implicated in the homeostasis of the neuronal medium. In this work, we analyze the effect of ethanol on extracellular zinc management by rat astrocytes in culture. Methods Intracellular levels of 'free…