[go: up one dir, main page]
More Web Proxy on the site http://driver.im/
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/aea/aecrev/v102y2012i3p453-58.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Ricardo's Theory of Comparative Advantage: Old Idea, New Evidence

Author

Listed:
  • Arnaud Costinot
  • Dave Donaldson
Abstract
When asked to name one proposition in the social sciences that is both true and non-trivial, Paul Samuelson famously replied: 'Ricardo's theory of comparative advantage'. Truth, however, in Samuelson's reply refers to the fact that Ricardo's theory of comparative advantage is mathematically correct, not that it is empirically valid. In this paper we develop and implement an empirical test of Ricardo's ideas. We use novel agricultural data that describe the productivity in 17 crops of 1.6 million parcels of land in 55 countries around the world. We find that a regression of log observed output on log predicted output has a (precisely estimated) slope of 0.84 and an R-squared of 0.93. In our view, these findings offer considerable support for Ricardo's ideas.

Suggested Citation

  • Arnaud Costinot & Dave Donaldson, 2012. "Ricardo's Theory of Comparative Advantage: Old Idea, New Evidence," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(3), pages 453-458, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:aea:aecrev:v:102:y:2012:i:3:p:453-58
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.aeaweb.org/articles.php?doi=10.1257/aer.102.3.453
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to AEA members and institutional subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Nathan Nunn & Nancy Qian, 2011. "The Potato's Contribution to Population and Urbanization: Evidence From A Historical Experiment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 126(2), pages 593-650.
    2. Arnaud Costinot, 2009. "An Elementary Theory of Comparative Advantage," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 77(4), pages 1165-1192, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Costinot, Arnaud & Donaldson, Dave, 2016. "How Large Are the Gains from Economic Integration? Theory and Evidence from U.S. Agriculture, 1880-1997," CEPR Discussion Papers 11712, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    2. Beestermöller, Matthias, 2017. "Striking Evidence? Demand Persistence for Inter-City Buses from German Railway Strikes," Discussion Papers in Economics 31768, University of Munich, Department of Economics.
    3. Yi Li, 2020. "Internet Development and Structural Transformation: Evidence from China," Journal of Applied Finance & Banking, SCIENPRESS Ltd, vol. 10(1), pages 1-8.
    4. Mengus, Eric & Davis, Donald R. & Michalski, Tomasz K., 2020. "Labor Market Polarization and The Great Divergence: Theory and Evidence," CEPR Discussion Papers 14623, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    5. Mara P. Squicciarini & Nico Voigtländer, 2015. "Human Capital and Industrialization: Evidence from the Age of Enlightenment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 130(4), pages 1825-1883.
    6. Oliver Falck & Michael Fritsch & Stephan Heblich & Anne Otto, 2018. "Music in the air: estimating the social return to cultural amenities," Journal of Cultural Economics, Springer;The Association for Cultural Economics International, vol. 42(3), pages 365-391, August.
    7. Thomas Sampson, 2014. "Selection into Trade and Wage Inequality," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 6(3), pages 157-202, August.
    8. Litina, Anastasia, 2012. "Unfavorable land endowment, cooperation, and reversal of fortune," MPRA Paper 39702, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Ai, Hongshan & Zhou, Zhengqing & Li, Ke & Kang, Zhi-Yong, 2021. "Impacts of the desulfurization price subsidy policy on SO2 reduction: Evidence from China's coal-fired power plants," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    10. Maya Eden, 2017. "Misallocation and the Distribution of Global Volatility," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(2), pages 592-622, February.
    11. Johnson, Noel D. & Koyama, Mark, 2017. "Jewish communities and city growth in preindustrial Europe," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 127(C), pages 339-354.
    12. Bertocchi, Graziella & Dimico, Arcangelo, 2020. "Bitter Sugar: Slavery and the Black Family," GLO Discussion Paper Series 564, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    13. Johannes Boehm & Swati Dhingra & John Morrow, 2022. "The Comparative Advantage of Firms," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 130(12), pages 3025-3100.
    14. William R Kerr, 2018. "Heterogeneous Technology Diffusion and Ricardian Trade Patterns," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 32(1), pages 163-182.
    15. Chaoran Chen & Diego Restuccia & Raul Santaeulalia-Llopis, 2022. "The Effects of Land Markets on Resource Allocation and Agricultural Productivity," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 45, pages 41-54, July.
    16. Guinnane, Timothy W., 2023. "We Do Not Know the Population of Every Country in the World for the Past Two Thousand Years," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 83(3), pages 912-938, September.
    17. Combes, Pierre-Philippe & Gobillon, Laurent & Zylberberg, Yanos, 2022. "Urban economics in a historical perspective: Recovering data with machine learning," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(C).
    18. Rohan Dutta & David K. Levine & Nicholas W. Papageorge & Lemin Wu, 2018. "Entertaining Malthus: Bread, Circuses, And Economic Growth," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 56(1), pages 358-380, January.
    19. Dhingra, Swati & Tenreyro, Silvana, 2021. "The Rise of Agribusinesses and its Distributional Consequences," CEPR Discussion Papers 15942, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    20. Negi, D., 2018. "Geography and the Welfare Impact of Food Price Shock," 2018 Conference, July 28-August 2, 2018, Vancouver, British Columbia 277150, International Association of Agricultural Economists.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • F10 - International Economics - - Trade - - - General
    • F11 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Neoclassical Models of Trade

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:aea:aecrev:v:102:y:2012:i:3:p:453-58. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Michael P. Albert (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/aeaaaea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.