Global trade in services : fear, facts, and offshoring / J. Bradford Jensen.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Jensen, J. Bradford.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Service industries.

Service industries--United States.

United States.

International trade.

Physical Description:

xix, 245 pages : illustrations, maps ; 23 cm

Place of Publication:

Washington, DC : Peterson Institute for International Economics, 2011.

Summary:

The service sector is large and growing and international trade in services is expanding rapidly. Yet there is a dearth of empirical research on the size, scope, and potential impact of service trade. The underlying source of this gap is well-known-official statistics on the service sector in general, and trade in services in particular, are inadequate.

Because services are such a large and important component of the US economy, understanding the potential implications of increased service trade is crucial. In this path-breaking book, J. Bradford Jensen conducts primary research using a range of data sources to produce the most'detailed and robust portrait available on the size, scope, and potential impact of trade in services on the US economy. Jensen presents new evidence on the prevalence of service firm participation in interna tional trade. He finds that, in spite of US comparative advantage in service activities, service firms' export participation lags manufacturing firms. Jensen evaluates the impediments to'service trade and finds evidence that there is considerable room for liberalization-especially among the large, fast-growing developing economies.

The policy recommendations coming out of this path-breaking study are quite clear. The United States should not fear trade in services. It should be pushing aggressively for service trade liberalization. Because other advanced economies have similar comparative advantage in services, the United States should make common cause with the European Union and other advanced economies to encourage the large, fast-growing developing economies to liberalize their service sectors through multilateral negotiations in the General Agreement on Trade in Services and the Government Procurement Agreement. Jensen notes that the coming global infrastructure building boom is of historic proportions and provides an enormous opportunity for US service firms if the proper policies are in place. Increased trade in services might help rebalance the global economy, and both developed and developing economies would benefit from the productivity-enhancing ' reallocation brought by increased trade in services. Book jacket.

Contents:

Some basic facts about the service sector and service trade

A new approach to identifying tradable services

Characteristics of workers in tradable service industries

Comparative advantage : lessons from manufacturing

Comparative advantage : prospects for the service sector

Impediments to trade in services

Labor market impact of increased service trade

Trade services across US regions : opportunities and vulnerabilities.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

0881326011

9780881326017

OCLC:

741103553

Publisher Number:

99946407089