International Trade

Knowledge outcomes

You will learn about

• comparative advantage and the gains from trade
• theories of comparative advantage
• patterns and forces of international trade in a world with many goods and factors of production
• empirical tests of trade models
• international trade and factor mobility
• theories of trade under imperfect competition and increasing returns to scale
• new economic geography: the role of location and externalities in shaping the pattern of production and trade
• foreign Direct Investment and Multinational corporations
• international trade and growth

Skills

You should be able to

• understand the general equilibrium relationship between factor endowments, the location of production, and international trade
• use general equilibrium techniques to analyse a variety of issues in international trade including the links between trade and wage inequality and the effects of trade policy
• understand the implications of imperfect competition, increasing returns to scale, and transport costs for patterns of international trade, the conduct of trade policy, and the location of economic activity in space
• understand the working and applications of models of Foreign Direct Investment
• know some of the empirical evidence relating to international trade, the geographical concentration of production, and Foreign Direct Investment
• use and adapt economic models to address key issues in international trade

Competence

You should be able to

• read and understand project reports and journal articles that make use of the concepts and methods that are introduced in the course
• make use of the course content in your own academic work, for example in analyses that are part of the master || chr(38) ||rsquo;s thesis

ECON4200 - Microeconomics and game theory, ECON4215 - Microeconomics (discontinued), ECON4230 - Microeconomic Theory (discontinued) or ECON4235 - Microeconomic Theory (discontinued)
The prerequisites are fulfilled if one of the courses mentioned above is taken during the same semester as ECON4415 - International trade

Students who are admitted to study programmes at UiO must each semester register which courses and exams they wish to sign up for in StudentWeb.

Students enrolled in other Master || chr(38) ||#39;s Degree Programmes can, on application, be admitted to the course if this is cleared by their own study programme.

International applicants, if you are not already enrolled as a student at UiO, please see our information about admission requirements and procedures for international applicants.

The examination in this course is not available for external candidates. Only students admitted to the course may sit for the examination.

Lectures: 2 hours per week througout the semester.

Seminars: 2 hours per week through parts of the semester.

There might occur weeks exempt from teaching.

The examination will be a 3-hour written school exam.

Previous exams and examiner guidelines

Exam papers with comments by examiner

No examination support material is allowed.

You can usually resit an exam, but the conditions depend on whether you had a valid reason for absence from the regular exam. Read more about resitting an exam.

The Department of Economics has passed following resolution for ECON-courses: It will no longer be possible for candidates to register for an exam in a lower level course after having passed exams in intermediate and advanced level courses in the same subject area (also where there are no pre-requisites that apply to the intermediate course). Further information can be found here.

Students who might wish to retake the exam later, are not guaranteed that the course is ever repeated with a similar reading list, nor that the exam arrangement will be the same.

Grades are awarded on a scale from A to F, where A is the best grade and F is a fail. Read more about the grading system.

The problem set will be given in English. Answers can be given in Norwegian, Swedish, Danish or in English. See || chr(38) ||sect; 6.4 i Forskrift om studier og eksamener ved Universitetet i Oslo .

You may request an explanation of your grades, and you may also appeal against your grades or make a complaint about formal examination errors. Read more about explanations and appeals.

Overlapping courses

Books

I. References

Required textbooks

Dixit, Avinash and Norman, Victor D.: Theory of International Trade: A Dual, General Equlibrium Approach, 1980. Cambridge Economic Handbooks, Cambridge University Press.

Feenstra, Robert C.: Advanced International trade: Theory and Evidence, 2004. Princeton University Press.

Krugman, Paul Rr: Rethinking international trade, 1994. MIT Press. ch. 5, 6.

Krugman, Paul R. : Geography and trade, 1991. MIT Press. all chapters.

Other useful texts (Undergraudate textbooks)

Krugman and Obstfeld. International Economics: Theory and Policy, 8th ed.

Norman, V. og L. Orvedal. 2010. Næringstruktur og Utenrikshandel. Universitetsforlaget Oslo.

II. Topics and selected reading

Section I. Introduction: Facts and basic methods

1. Trade facts

Krugman, P. 1993. What do undergrads need to know about trade?. AER.May 2003.

Freeman, Richard B.: "Trade Wars: The Exaggerated Impact of Trade in Economic Debate" i 2003. NBER Working paper 10000 here

2. General equilibrium and the gains from trade

DN ch. 1,2,3

Feenstra ch. 1,6,7

Krugman, 1994, ch. 5

3. Technological differences and trade: The Ricardian model

DN ch. 2-4

Feenstra ch 1

Dornbusch, R., S. Fischer, and P. Samuelson. 1977. Comparative Advantage, Trade and Payments in a Ricardian Model with a Continuum of Goods. American Economic Review 67: pp. 823-839.

4. The Specifi c factor model (Ricardo-Viner)

DN ch. 2, 4

Feenstra ch. 3

5. The Factor endowment model (Heckscher-Ohlin)

DN ch. 2-4

Feenstra ch 2.

Section II: Imperfect competition and the geography of trade

6. Imperfect competition and trade

DN ch. 9

Feenstra ch 5.

Krugman, P.: "Scale Economies, Product Differentiation, and the Pattern of Trade" i American Economic Review 70, 1980. pp 950-959 <a href="http://www.jstor.org/sici?sici=00

If you have a disability or a health problem that entails significant inconvenience in an examination situation, you may be considered for special examination arrangements. Mothers who are breastfeeding may apply for extra time to complete the exam.

A student may sit this exam up to 3 times. If a student wishes to withdraw from the exam, s/he must do so in StudentWeb at least two weeks prior to the first day of the exam. Failure to do so will be counted as one of the three opportunities to sit the exam.