Reviews for Trade Policy Issues and Empirical Analysis

The average rating for Trade Policy Issues and Empirical Analysis based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2014-10-09 00:00:00 Cor Enfa Overall all a good book with convincing empirical evidence on how the entirety of private non-farm US GDP is priced. Worth a read. The best chapters are 1-5, 11, 12, 13, 17, 18. The one weird thing is that Blinder et al never fully break out of their basic ontological framework where price movements would be inevitable if not for 'friction', and they'd move with walrasian efficiency. Areas where the survey results clash with parts of theory are constantly referred to as "unfortunate" or "bad news", and when a theory matches reality its considered "good news". Normal researchers should have a more platonic attitude. In contrast, economists seem to see their role as less observing and understanding the economy but instead creating armchair deductive theories and defending them at all costs. All 12 interior chapters of the book would be unnecessary if the survey method was the norm in the first instance and economists induced conditional, historical theories based on survey. At the end of the book we understand that prices are sticky--but compared to what? Compared to a hypothetical made up standard. A more sane title for the book would be "Firm Price Setting in the Private Non-Farm US GDP". Check out Paul Downward and Fred Lee's 1998 review of the book "Asking About Prices: Post Keynesian Price Theory Reconfirmed".

Review # 2 was written on 2015-02-14 00:00:00 Becky Ivko Comprehensive and easy to digest review of statistical analysis techniques with specific examples geared towards economics.