Kenzo Abe - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Kenzo Abe

The Economic studies quarterly, Sep 20, 1989

The Economic studies quarterly, Sep 20, 1988

Resource and Energy Economics

The Economic studies quarterly, 1989

This paper investigates the impact of various economic measures on child labor in an open dual ec... more This paper investigates the impact of various economic measures on child labor in an open dual economy. We construct a small open economy model with heterogeneity of households in terms of location of residency and income. A part of households with low income supplies child labor when they reside in the rural area. The measures we will mainly consider are trade policies (e.g. import tariff and subsidy) and consumer boycott on child-labor-used products with various scopes of boycotts. These measures affect child labor supply through changes in 1) the proportion of rural population due to migration between rural and urban areas, 2) the overall income of household due to increase in the return to labor and endogenous supply of child labor, and 3) the cost of living. Depending on economic conditions, these three effects can explain different experiences of fighting efforts against child labor in developing countries.

The Economic studies quarterly, 1988

This paper incorporates pollution emissions from international transportation into the standard m... more This paper incorporates pollution emissions from international transportation into the standard model of strategic trade and environmental policies, and investigates the effect of trade liberalization and some form of environmental agreement on national welfare and environment. Our model explicitly includes the imperfectly competitive market for inter-national transportation, as well as the imperfectly competitive market for final products. We find that a trade liberalization may reduce each country's welfare unless some level of environmental regulation on international transportation is in place. In addition, when trade is fairly liberalized, a mutual increase in the common emission tax rates may improve each country's welfare. However, when trade is not fairly liberalized, imposing emission tax on international transportation may reduce welfare.

This paper examines the effects of trade policy on a distortion of using the common resource and ... more This paper examines the effects of trade policy on a distortion of using the common resource and urban unemployment in the developing country. We will also investigate the welfare effects of that policy. We assume that in a rural area an agricultural good is produced by using the common resource, e.g., land or stock of forest. We will derive the resource allocation and welfare effects of that policy in the standard Harris-Todaro model where each producer in the rural region maximizes his/her own profits given the stock of common resources and the rival's labor input.

We examine the effectiveness of trade liberalization of an environmental good and a final good in... more We examine the effectiveness of trade liberalization of an environmental good and a final good in a small open economy. The environmental good is the one which contribute to reducing an emission of pollution. We will show that a reduction in the tariff on the environmental good may decrease the welfare of the country when the initial tariff on the final good is sufficiently high. The optimal tariff on the environmental good becomes smaller when the government reduces the tariff on the final good and chooses the optimal emission tax.

In this paper, we construct a partial equilibrium trade model with oligopolistic domestic and int... more In this paper, we construct a partial equilibrium trade model with oligopolistic domestic and international transportation sectors which are yielding emissions from their transportations. Foreign firms export a final good to a home country, but they have to use the international transportation from a port of the foreign country to a port of a home country and the domestic transportation from the port of the home country to a home market. Domestic firms use only a domestic transportation. The home government controls tariff and emission tax on the domestic transportation. We show that the optimal tariff and emission tax depends on the distances of domestic and international transportation and the numbers of home and foreign transportation firms.

The International Economy, 2015

We analyze the optimal level of privatization of a stateowned enterprise (SOE) in a renewable res... more We analyze the optimal level of privatization of a stateowned enterprise (SOE) in a renewable resource sector. We construct a model where a SOE and a foreign private enterprise compete in quantity in a market of a renewable resource good. In the shortrun, a government should privatize the SOE when the foreign private enterprise is present, while it should keep the SOE when the foreign firm is absent. In the longrun, a government should privatize its SOE regardless of the presence or the absence of the foreign private competitor.

Review of Development Economics, 2016

This paper examines the effects of an export tax (on a processed resource good), the number of ha... more This paper examines the effects of an export tax (on a processed resource good), the number of harvesters and an afforestation policy in a small, open economy with urban unemployment. The export tax increases the urban unemployment rate, but improves the quality of the environment. Here, the optimal export tax is lower than the adjusted marginal environmental damage. Reducing the number of harvesters has a similar resource allocation effect to that of an export tax. However, the afforestation policy can resolve the tradeoff between urban unemployment and the quality of the environment and may also improve the welfare of a country.

Japanese Economic Review, 2014

ABSTRACT Incorporating pollution emissions from international transportation into a model of stra... more ABSTRACT Incorporating pollution emissions from international transportation into a model of strategic trade and environmental policies, we investigate the effect of trade liberalization and environmental regulation on national welfare and the environment. Our model includes imperfectly competitive markets for international transportation and final products. We find that trade liberalization may reduce each country's welfare unless some level of environmental regulation on international transportation is in place. When international trade is liberalized initially, a mutual increase in the common emission tax rates may improve each country's welfare. However, when international trade is highly protected initially, imposing an emission tax may reduce welfare.

The International Economy, 2002

Review of International Economics, 2005

In this paper we present a model of tied aid to shed light on the dispute between Kemp and Kojima... more In this paper we present a model of tied aid to shed light on the dispute between Kemp and Kojima (1985) and Schweinberger (1990) and to complement their analyses. We show that if the households of the recipient country are not informed of the transfers at their consumption decision, they have an incentive to trade the purchased goods from their domestic production income whenever transfer paradoxes occur. We also demonstrate that when they are aware of the transfers and can trade the purchased goods from their production income, there are no transfer paradoxes under the normality condition of commodities.