Export Restrictions and COVID-19

As a result of COVID-19, the export of medical goods has been subject to various global restrictions. Consequently, several countries have increased the supply of medical goods to alleviate the effects of this health crisis. This study entails a theoretical and empirical analysis of the effects of such remedial measures. To this end, we have utilized a consistent conjectural variation in a three-country model entailing firms competing in two reciprocal markets in Cournot. When the restrictions are unilateral, the number of medical goods available in the exporting country tends to increase, culminating in better management of the pandemic. In contrast, bilateral restrictions typically reduce the total output of medical goods; therefore, they are inappropriate in a pandemic situation.

US-China Trade War: Causes and Outcomes

The article reviews the chronology and analyses the causes and possible consequences of the trade war between the US and China. The authors identify four main reasons that led to the greatest trade conflict between the two economies in history associated with intentions of the US: a) to reduce the deficit of bilateral trade and increase the number of jobs; b) to limit access of Chinese companies to American technologies and prevent digital modernization of the industry in the PRC; c) to prevent the growth of China’s military strength; and d) to reduce the federal budget deficit. It is confirmed and concluded that trade wars have no winners. Taking into account the two countries’ GDP scale and export volumes, the US-China trade war will come amid a slowdown in the global production and international trade. The article analyses the outcomes of the trade confrontation based on the scenario methodology. The authors identify 4 scenarios by making assumptions about the response pattern and conjectural variation in the bilateral economic relations. The US protectionist policy has its political dimension. The constraints of the bilateral trade is one of the tools for slowing China's military and economic power growth.

Profits Under Centralized Negotiations: The Efficient Bargaining Case

Making use of a Conjectural Variation model, the present note re-examines the subject of the firms’ profits ranking under different degrees of market competition in a unionized duopoly with industry-wide Efficient Bargaining (EB). It is shown that, while Cournot-like competition profits are always larger than Bertrand-like ones with separated wage negotiations, an uniform wage bargaining can lead to the appearance of the reversal.

PENETRASI BANK ASING DAN PENGARUHNYA TERHADAP KOMPETISI PERBANKAN YANG DIUKUR DENGAN PENDEKATAN CONJECTURAL VARIATION DI INDONESIA

<p>This study examines the effect of foreign bank penetration on banking competition in Indonesia. Penetration of foreign banks is measured by using the ratio between total assets, total loans and total deposits of foreign banks to total assets, total loans and total deposits of the banking industry in Indonesia, such as those used by Levy and Micco (2007). Bank concentration is measured by using Concentration Ratio (CR3 and CR5) and the Herfindahl index. Bank competition is measured by using the Conjectural Variation approach as used by Cetorelli Angelini (2003). By using panel regression method with SUR (Seemingly Unrelated Regression) during 1998 to 2009, we found that the increase of foreign bank penetration will increase competition of banking in Indonesia through spillover effects on the domestic banking system. These results support the research of Jeon et al (2011).<br />Keywords: Foreign Bank Penetration, Conjectural Variation and Bank Competition</p>