Vers and Expectations

This paper analyses the effects of an expected future voluntary export restraint on the level of firms' current exports to a market. The traditional result that current exports increase is shown to depend on the degree of collusion in the exporting industry and the anticipated restrictiveness of the VER. The former relationship is tested by reference to the effect of EC import surveillance on its imports. Surveillance is argued to indicate an increased probability of a VER in the future, and it is found that while competitive industries respond to it by increasing exports to the EC, less competitive ones curtail exports. This constitutes one of the few empirical tests of the strategic part of strategic trade policy

Business · Collusion · Economics · Empirical evidence · Industrial organization · International economics · International trade · Monetary economics · Restrictiveness · Global Financial Crisis and Policies · Global trade and economics · International Business and FDI