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International Trade - Theory and Policy, 2010a

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4. There is free entry <strong>and</strong> exit of firms in response to profits. Positive profit sends a signal to the rest of the economy<br />

<strong>and</strong> new firms enter the industry. Negative profit (losses) leads existing firms to exit, one by one, out of the industry.<br />

As a result, in the long run economic profit is driven to zero in the industry.<br />

5. Information is perfect. For example, all firms have the necessary information to maximize profit <strong>and</strong> to identify the<br />

positive profit <strong>and</strong> negative profit industries.<br />

Two Countries<br />

The case of two countries is used to simplify the model analysis. Let one country be the United States, the<br />

other France. Note that anything related exclusively to France in the model will be marked with an<br />

asterisk.<br />

Two Goods<br />

Two goods are produced by both countries. We assume a barter economy. This means that there is no<br />

money used to make transactions. Instead, for trade to occur, goods must be traded for other goods. Thus<br />

we need at least two goods in the model. Let the two produced goods be clothing <strong>and</strong> steel.<br />

Two Factors<br />

Two factors of production, labor <strong>and</strong> capital, are used to produce clothing <strong>and</strong> steel. Both labor <strong>and</strong> capital<br />

are homogeneous. Thus there is only one type of labor <strong>and</strong> one type of capital. The laborers <strong>and</strong> capital<br />

equipment in different industries are exactly the same. We also assume that labor <strong>and</strong> capital are freely<br />

mobile across industries within the country but immobile across countries. Free mobility makes the<br />

Heckscher-Ohlin (H-O) model a long-run model.<br />

Factor Constraints<br />

The total amount of labor <strong>and</strong> capital used in production is limited to the endowment of the country.<br />

The labor constraint is<br />

LC + LS = L,<br />

where LC <strong>and</strong> LS are the quantities of labor used in clothing <strong>and</strong> steel production,<br />

respectively. L represents the labor endowment of the country. Full employment of labor implies the<br />

expression would hold with equality.<br />

The capital constraint is<br />

KC + KS = K,<br />

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

Saylor.org<br />

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