Trade Structure, Industrial Structure, and International Business Cycles
This paper examines the extent to which the composition of a count ry’s production and trade
differs among its trade partners. For example, does the US export the same bundle of goods to
the UK as it does to Japan? If we find high dispersion in a country’s export and import bundles
with its various trading partners, can this be linked to identifiable country characteristics? These
findings are important for two reasons. First, they enrich our empirical understanding of the
nature of trade. Second, they will stand as a guide for further development of economic theories
of the international transmission of business cycles.