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International Trade - Theory and Policy, 2010a

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increase in national welfare essentially means that the sum of the gains to the winners will exceed the sum<br />

of the losses to the losers. For this reason, economists often apply the compensation principle.<br />

The compensation principle states that as long as the total benefits exceed the total losses in the<br />

movement to free trade, then it must be possible to redistribute income from the winners to the losers<br />

such that everyone has at least as much as they had before trade liberalization occurred.<br />

Note that the “st<strong>and</strong>ard” H-O model refers to the case of two countries, two goods, <strong>and</strong> two factors of<br />

production. The H-O model has been extended to many countries, many goods, <strong>and</strong> many factors, but<br />

most of the exposition in this text, <strong>and</strong> by economists in general, is in reference to the st<strong>and</strong>ard case.<br />

KEY TAKEAWAYS<br />

<br />

The H-O model is a two-country, two-good, two-factor model that assumes production processes differ<br />

in their factor intensities, while countries differ in their factor abundancies.<br />

<br />

The Rybczynski theorem states there is a positive relationship between changes in a factor endowment<br />

<strong>and</strong> changes in the output of the product that uses that factor intensively.<br />

<br />

The Stolper-Samuelson theorem states there is a positive relationship between changes in a product’s<br />

price <strong>and</strong> changes in the payment made to the factor used intensively in that industry.<br />

<br />

The Heckscher-Ohlin theorem predicts the pattern of trade: it says that a capital-abundant (laborabundant)<br />

country will export the capital-intensive (labor-intensive) good <strong>and</strong> import the labor-intensive<br />

(capital-intensive) good.<br />

<br />

The factor-price equalization theorem demonstrates that when product prices are equalized through trade,<br />

the factor prices (wages <strong>and</strong> rents) will be equalized as well.<br />

EXERCISE<br />

1. Jeopardy Questions. As in the popular television game show, you are given an answer to a<br />

question <strong>and</strong> you must respond with the question. For example, if the answer is “a tax on<br />

imports,” then the correct question is “What is a tariff?”<br />

1. The term used to describe the income earned on capital usage.<br />

2. The term used to describe the ratio of capital usage to labor usage in an industry.<br />

3. The term used to describe an industry that uses more capital per worker than another industry.<br />

Saylor URL: http://www.saylor.org/books<br />

Saylor.org<br />

184

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