NATIONAL BUREAU OF ECONOMIC RESEARCH
NATIONAL BUREAU OF ECONOMIC RESEARCH

Doomed to Deficits? Aggregate U.S. Trade Flows Re-Examined

Menzie D. Chinn

NBER Working Paper No. 9521*
Issued in March 2003
NBER Program(s):   IFM    ITI

This paper examines the stability of import and export demand functions for the United States over the 1975q1-2001q2 period. Using the Johansen maximum likelihood approach, an export demand function is readily identified. In contrast, there appears to be a structural break in the import demand function in 1995; specifications incorporating this break pass tests for cointegration, although the price elasticity is not statistically significant. Only when excluding computers and parts from the import series is a stable import demand function detected. The resulting point estimates do not exhibit the income asymmetry typically found in other studies of aggregate U.S. trade flows.

*Published: Menzie D. Chinn, 2005. "Doomed to Deficits? Aggregate U.S. Trade Flows Re-Examined," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer, vol. 141(3), pages 460-485, October.

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