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Trade and Foreign Exchange (Micro)


Border Patrol (2/27/2007)

To enhance profit, businesses often sell non-interoperable versions of the same products in different markets.

Keywords: DVD, movie, Palm Zaire, price discrimination, printer, product cycle, region code, region locks

Byrding for Profit (6/25/2004)

U. S. shrimpers use anti-dumping protection to resist competitive pressure from more efficient Asian shrimp farmers and to gain de facto subsidy.

Keywords: anti-dumping, Asia, Byrd amendment, overproduction, protection, shrimp, subsidy, tariff

Dividing the Pie (5/13/2010)

Over-extended American consumers provided the ultimate market for consumer goods exported from low-wage countries that are willing to sell on credit.

Keywords: cheap labor, credit, economic pie, globalization, imbalance, profit share, Reserve currency, saving rate, trade deficit, wage share

Gray Market (11/5/1999)

Gray markets appear when cheaper goods in one market are diverted to compete with more expensive but similar goods in another market.

Keywords: cigarettes., distributors, diversion, diverters, gray market, high-end market, low-end market, parallel imports, price discrimination

Hedging Inflation with Prostitution (1/30/2015)

Prostitution has proven to be an effective hedge against high inflation induced by subsidies and price control in Venezuela.

Keywords: Bolivar, currency trader, devaluation, dollar, exchange rate, inflation, inflation hedge, price control, prostitutes, Smuggling, subsidized gas, Venezuela

Moving Up by Staying Put (8/30/2001)

American companies are increasingly outsourcing back-office and software design work to highly skilled but lower-cost English-speaking foreign workers.

Keywords: back office, foreign workers, globalization, H1-B visa, high- tech industry, immigrants, jobs, labor mobility, migration, outsourcing, salary, skilled workers, wage

No Chicken Feet! (1/3/2013)

Chicken feet, long considered a waste product in the US, have become a profit center for the high-volume low-profit US chicken industry in the China export market. But this export trade is not exempted from political whims.

Keywords: byproduct, chicken feet, China, comparative advantage, culture, export, fixed cost, inferior good, tariff, trade protection, US

Sugar Daddy (6/22/2006)

US subsidies to domestic sugar cane and sugar beet growers have resulted in huge collateral damage to domestic industries and overseas producers.

Keywords: candy, import quota, price support, subsidies, sugar, sugar beet, sugar cane

Your Technology or Your Market Access (2/8/2007)

In a buyer's market with many potential sellers, China exacts technology transfers as a condition of entry into its lucrative mass market.

Keywords: Airbus, Boeing, buyer's market, chip fabrication, efficiency, licensing, market access, Motorola, offsets, seller's market, technology transfer, trade distorting