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Carbon tariffs are one prominently discussed environmental policy. The proponents stress the carbon tariffs' ability to mitigate the potential negative effect of environmental-friendly production on competitiveness, to avoid carbon leakage and to reduce world carbon emissions. We analyze the effects of carbon tariffs on trade, welfare and carbon emissions in a multi-sector, two-factor gravity model. The introduction of carbon tariffs reduces welfare in most countries, but the effect tends to be more pronounced in poorer countries. Further, carbon emissions are massively shifted from these countries to richer countries. Most remarkably, world carbon emissions increase by 0.49 percent in the investigated counterfactual scenario, with a bootstrapped 95% confidence interval of [0.44, 0.55].

In dieser Studie wird anhand verschiedener Ansätze versucht, die Länder und Industrien mit den größten Exportpotenzialen für Bayern zu identifizieren. Der Pluralismus der Ansätze ermöglicht eine differenzierte Analyse der bayerischen Exportpotenziale. Zur Bestimmung von möglicherweise weiteren interessanten Zielländern für bayerische Exporte wurde einerseits ermittelt, in welchen Ländern sich die bayerischen Exporte besonders dynamisch bzw. besonders wenig dynamisch entwickelt haben (Attraktivitätsansatz) und andererseits in welchen Ländern eine Über- bzw. Unterausschöpfung eines hypothetischen Exportpotenzials vorliegt (Gravitationsansatz). Eine vom ifo-Institut durchgeführte ergänzende Umfrage bei bayerischen Exportunternehmen, die vor allem kleinere und mittlere Unternehmen angesprochen hat, zielt darauf ab, die von den befragten Markt- und Sachkundigen erwarteten zukünftigen Entwicklungen zu erfassen.- ... - Der Wertschöpfungsanteil der Dienstleistungen am Sozialprodukt hat sich in allen Industrieländern langfristig erheblich erhöht und liegt heute deutlich über dem des Industriesektors. Demgegenüber ist der Anteil der Exporte von Dienstleistungen am Sozialprodukt weit geringer als der der Warenexporte. Darüber hinaus weisen Dienstleistungsexporte auch eine deutlich geringere Dynamik auf, die bei Warenexporten nach wie vor höher ist. Bayerische Dienstleistungsunternehmen sind bereits vielfach international orientiert. In einer Umfrage geben sie an, ihre Auslandsaktivitäten in zahlreiche weitere Länder auszudehnen zu wollen. Das Ausmaß dieser geplanten Ausweitung liegt allerdings unter dem Niveau, das von nicht im Dienstleistungsbereich operierenden bayerischen Unternehmen vorgesehen ist. Bayerische Dienstleister sehen ein zukünftig noch wachsendes Auslandsengagement einerseits in den nahe gelegenen europäischen Ländern, andererseits vor allem auch in Asien.

A source of anxiety of policy makers and the public in general is the detrimental impact of trade and immigration on unemployment. The transitory restrictions for worker migration after the EU enlargements of 2004 and 2007 exemplify the supposed negative effect of immigration on labor markets. This paper aims to identify the effects of immigration alongside trade on unemployment controlling for the high correlation between immigration and goods flows in order to prevent an omitted variable bias. The authors use data from 24 OECD countries over the period from 1997 to 2007 and employ instrumental variables fixed effects and dynamic panel estimators in order to account for unobserved heterogeneity as well as the potential endogeneity of migration flows and the high persistence of unemployment. We find no significant effect of immigration on unemployment on average.

Abstract When the world economy was recently hit by a severe recession, governments all over the world reacted by initiating stimulus packages. Some countries (among them, most notably, China and the US) tried to put special emphasis on their home industries by including 'Buy National' clauses into the stimulus package. By analyzing the dynamics of transitory changes of trade barriers as a short‐run response to an economic downturn, we show that beggar‐thy‐neighbour policies do not work. We then come up with two rationales that help us understand why countries nevertheless consider protectionism to be a good response to a recession: (i) the lobbying of domestic, non‐exporting firms, and (ii) the relationship between vulnerability, the degree of openness and loss aversion of consumers.

Abstract
We introduce unemployment and endogenous selection of workers into different skill-classes in a trade model with two sectors and heterogeneous firms. This allows us to identify three different channels through which trade liberalization can affect unemployment: specialization, changes in productivity, and mobility. These three channels may work in opposite directions and their relative importance depends on the type of trade (intra-industry trade vs. inter-industry trade) and the skill-class of a worker.
We show that the gains from trade are distributed very unequally. When a skilled worker abundant country opens up to trade with a country that is unskilled worker abundant, the biggest losers are the skilled workers in the import sector in the skill abundant country. However, average unemployment among skilled workers goes down, while average unemployment among unskilled workers goes up.

Recently, the world economy has seen its greatest down turn since World War II. Although not as bad as during the Great Depression, there was still a worrisome increase in protectionist measures, in an attempt to mitigate the economic downturn. Protectionism can have many different faces. It can come in the form of Buy-American clauses of stimulus packages, as an increase in trade barriers or tariffs, or as an increase in export subsidies. In this paper, we show that none of these measures constitutes an effective response to economic downturns. Although Buy-American clauses and export subsidies stimulate output in the short run, they are less effective than general government spending impulses. Raising tariffs or trade barriers even decreases output.

A source of anxiety of policy makers and the public in general is the detrimental impactof globalization and immigration on unemployment. The transitory restrictions forworker migration after the EU enlargements of 2004 and 2007 exemplify the supposednegative effect of immigration on labor markets. This paper aims to identify the effectsof immigration alongside trade on unemployment taking into account the substitutabilityof worker and goods flows. We use data from 24 OECD countries over the periodfrom 1997 to 2007 and employ instrumental variables fixed effects and dynamic panelestimators in order to account for unobserved heterogeneity as well as the potentialendogeneity of migration flows and the high persistence of unemployment. We find asignificant negative effect of immigration on unemployment on average.