assignment on economic globalisation

Effects of Economic Globalization

Globalization has led to increases in standards of living around the world, but not all of its effects are positive for everyone.

Social Studies, Economics, World History

Bangladesh Garment Workers

The garment industry in Bangladesh makes clothes that are then shipped out across the world. It employs as many as four million people, but the average worker earns less in a month than a U.S. worker earns in a day.

Photograph by Mushfiqul Alam

Put simply, globalization is the connection of different parts of the world. In economics, globalization can be defined as the process in which businesses, organizations, and countries begin operating on an international scale. Globalization is most often used in an economic context, but it also affects and is affected by politics and culture. In general, globalization has been shown to increase the standard of living in developing countries, but some analysts warn that globalization can have a negative effect on local or emerging economies and individual workers. A Historical View Globalization is not new. Since the start of civilization, people have traded goods with their neighbors. As cultures advanced, they were able to travel farther afield to trade their own goods for desirable products found elsewhere. The Silk Road, an ancient network of trade routes used between Europe, North Africa, East Africa, Central Asia, South Asia, and the Far East, is an example of early globalization. For more than 1,500 years, Europeans traded glass and manufactured goods for Chinese silk and spices, contributing to a global economy in which both Europe and Asia became accustomed to goods from far away. Following the European exploration of the New World, globalization occurred on a grand scale; the widespread transfer of plants, animals, foods, cultures, and ideas became known as the Columbian Exchange. The Triangular Trade network in which ships carried manufactured goods from Europe to Africa, enslaved Africans to the Americas, and raw materials back to Europe is another example of globalization. The resulting spread of slavery demonstrates that globalization can hurt people just as easily as it can connect people. The rate of globalization has increased in recent years, a result of rapid advancements in communication and transportation. Advances in communication enable businesses to identify opportunities for investment. At the same time, innovations in information technology enable immediate communication and the rapid transfer of financial assets across national borders. Improved fiscal policies within countries and international trade agreements between them also facilitate globalization. Political and economic stability facilitate globalization as well. The relative instability of many African nations is cited by experts as one of the reasons why Africa has not benefited from globalization as much as countries in Asia and Latin America. Benefits of Globalization Globalization provides businesses with a competitive advantage by allowing them to source raw materials where they are inexpensive. Globalization also gives organizations the opportunity to take advantage of lower labor costs in developing countries, while leveraging the technical expertise and experience of more developed economies. With globalization, different parts of a product may be made in different regions of the world. Globalization has long been used by the automotive industry , for instance, where different parts of a car may be manufactured in different countries. Businesses in several different countries may be involved in producing even seemingly simple products such as cotton T-shirts. Globalization affects services, too. Many businesses located in the United States have outsourced their call centers or information technology services to companies in India. As part of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), U.S. automobile companies relocated their operations to Mexico, where labor costs are lower. The result is more jobs in countries where jobs are needed, which can have a positive effect on the national economy and result in a higher standard of living. China is a prime example of a country that has benefited immensely from globalization. Another example is Vietnam, where globalization has contributed to an increase in the prices for rice, lifting many poor rice farmers out of poverty. As the standard of living increased, more children of poor families left work and attended school. Consumers benefit also. In general, globalization decreases the cost of manufacturing . This means that companies can offer goods at a lower price to consumers. The average cost of goods is a key aspect that contributes to increases in the standard of living. Consumers also have access to a wider variety of goods. In some cases, this may contribute to improved health by enabling a more varied and healthier diet; in others, it is blamed for increases in unhealthy food consumption and diabetes. Downsides Not everything about globalization is beneficial. Any change has winners and losers, and the people living in communities that had been dependent on jobs outsourced elsewhere often suffer. Effectively, this means that workers in the developed world must compete with lower-cost markets for jobs; unions and workers may be unable to defend against the threat of corporations that offer the alternative between lower pay or losing jobs to a supplier in a less expensive labor market. The situation is more complex in the developing world, where economies are undergoing rapid change. Indeed, the working conditions of people at some points in the supply chain are deplorable. The garment industry in Bangladesh, for instance, employs an estimated four million people, but the average worker earns less in a month than a U.S. worker earns in a day. In 2013, a textile factory building collapsed, killing more than 1,100 workers. Critics also suggest that employment opportunities for children in poor countries may increase negative impacts of child labor and lure children of poor families away from school. In general, critics blame the pressures of globalization for encouraging an environment that exploits workers in countries that do not offer sufficient protections. Studies also suggest that globalization may contribute to income disparity and inequality between the more educated and less educated members of a society. This means that unskilled workers may be affected by declining wages, which are under constant pressure from globalization. Into the Future Regardless of the downsides, globalization is here to stay. The result is a smaller, more connected world. Socially, globalization has facilitated the exchange of ideas and cultures, contributing to a world view in which people are more open and tolerant of one another.

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Related Resources

Trade and Globalization

How did international trade and globalization change over time? What is the structure today? And what is its impact?

By Esteban Ortiz-Ospina, Diana Beltekian and Max Roser

This page was first published in 2014 and last revised in April 2024.

On this topic page, you can find data, visualizations, and research on historical and current patterns of international trade, as well as discussions of their origins and effects.

Other research and writing on trade and globalization on Our World in Data:

• Is globalization an engine of economic development?
• Is trade a major driver of income inequality?

Related topics

Economic Growth

See all our data, visualizations, and writing on economic growth.

Economic Inequality

See all our data, visualizations, and writing on economic inequality.

See all our data, visualizations, and writing on migration.

See all interactive charts on Trade and Globalization ↓

Trade has changed the world economy

Trade has grown remarkably over the last century.

One of the most important developments of the last century has been the integration of national economies into a global economic system. This process of integration, often called globalization, has resulted in a remarkable growth in trade between countries.

The chart here shows the growth of world exports over more than the last two centuries. These estimates are in constant prices (i.e. have been adjusted to account for inflation) and are indexed at 1913 values.

The chart shows an extraordinary growth in international trade over the last couple of centuries: Exports today are more than 40 times larger than in 1913.

You can switch to a logarithmic scale under ‘Settings’. This will help you see that, over the long run, growth has roughly followed an exponential path.

The increase in trade has even outpaced economic growth

The chart above shows how much more trade we have today relative to a century ago. But what about trade relative to total economic output?

Over the last couple of centuries the world economy has experienced sustained positive economic growth , so looking at changes in trade relative to GDP offers another interesting perspective.

The next chart plots the value of traded goods relative to GDP (i.e. the value of merchandise trade as a share of global economic output).

Up to 1870, the sum of worldwide exports accounted for less than 10% of global output. Today, the value of exported goods around the world is around 25%. This shows that over the last hundred years, the growth in trade has even outpaced rapid economic growth.

Trade expanded in two waves

The first "wave of globalization" started in the 19th century, the second one after ww2.

The following visualization presents a compilation of available trade estimates, showing the evolution of world exports and imports as a share of global economic output .

This metric (the ratio of total trade, exports plus imports, to global GDP) is known as the “openness index”. The higher the index, the higher the influence of trade transactions on global economic activity. 1

As we can see, until 1800 there was a long period characterized by persistently low international trade – globally the index never exceeded 10% before 1800. This then changed over the course of the 19th century, when technological advances triggered a period of marked growth in world trade – the so-called “first wave of globalization”.

This first wave came to an end with the beginning of World War I, when the decline of liberalism and the rise of nationalism led to a slump in international trade. In the chart we see a large drop in the interwar period.

After World War II trade started growing again. This new – and ongoing – wave of globalization has seen international trade grow faster than ever before. Today the sum of exports and imports across nations amounts to more than 50% of the value of total global output. 2

Before the first wave of globalization, trade was driven mostly by colonialism

Over the early modern period, transoceanic flows of goods between empires and colonies accounted for an important part of international trade. The following visualizations provide a comparison of intercontinental trade, in per capita terms, for different countries.

As we can see, intercontinental trade was very dynamic, with volumes varying considerably across time and from empire to empire.

Leonor Freire Costa, Nuno Palma, and Jaime Reis, who compiled and published the original data shown here, argue that trade, also in this period, had a substantial positive impact on the economy. 3

The first wave of globalization was marked by the rise and collapse of intra-European trade

The following visualization shows a detailed overview of Western European exports by destination. Figures correspond to export-to-GDP ratios (i.e. the sum of the value of exports from all Western European countries, divided by the total GDP in this region). You can use “Settings” to switch to a relative view and see the proportional contribution of each region to total Western European exports.

This chart shows that growth in Western European trade throughout the 19th century was largely driven by trade within the region: In the period 1830-1900 intra-European exports went from 1% of GDP to 10% of GDP, and this meant that the relative weight of intra-European exports doubled over the period. However, this process of European integration then collapsed sharply in the interwar period.

After the Second World War trade within Europe rebounded, and from the 1990s onwards exceeded the highest levels of the first wave of globalization. In addition, Western Europe then started to increasingly trade with Asia, the Americas, and to a smaller extent Africa and Oceania.

The next graph, using data from Broadberry and O'Rourke (2010) 4 , shows another perspective on the integration of the global economy and plots the evolution of three indicators measuring integration across different markets – specifically goods, labor, and capital markets.

The indicators in this chart are indexed, so they show changes relative to the levels of integration observed in 1900. This gives us another perspective on how quickly global integration collapsed with the two World Wars. 5

The second wave of globalization was enabled by technology

The worldwide expansion of trade after the Second World War was largely possible because of reductions in transaction costs stemming from technological advances, such as the development of commercial civil aviation, the improvement of productivity in the merchant marines, and the democratization of the telephone as the main mode of communication. The visualization shows how, at the global level, costs across these three variables have been going down since 1930.

Reductions in transaction costs impacted not only the volumes of trade but also the types of exchanges that were possible and profitable.

The first wave of globalization was characterized by inter-industry trade. This means that countries exported goods that were very different from what they imported – England exchanged machines for Australian wool and Indian tea. As transaction costs went down, this changed. In the second wave of globalization, we are seeing a rise in intra -industry trade (i.e. the exchange of broadly similar goods and services is becoming more and more common). France, for example, now both imports and exports machines to and from Germany.

The following visualization, from the UN World Development Report (2009) , plots the fraction of total world trade that is accounted for by intra-industry trade, by type of goods. As we can see, intra-industry trade has been going up for primary, intermediate, and final goods.

This pattern of trade is important because the scope for specialization increases if countries are able to exchange intermediate goods (e.g. auto parts) for related final goods (e.g. cars).

Trade and trade partners by country

Above, we examined the broad global trends over the last two centuries. Let's now examine country-level trends over this long and dynamic period.

This chart plots estimates of the value of trade in goods, relative to total economic activity (i.e. export-to-GDP ratios).

These historical estimates obviously come with a large margin of error (in the measurement section below we discuss the data limitations); yet they offer an interesting perspective.

You can edit the countries and regions selected. Each country tells a different story. 7

In the next chart we plot, country by country, the regional breakdown of exports. India is shown by default, but you can edit the countries and regions shown.

When switching to displaying relative values under ‘Settings’, we see the proportional contribution of purchases from each region. For example, we see that more than a third of Indian exports went to Asian countries in recent decades.

This gives us an interesting perspective on the changing nature of trade partnerships. In India, we see the rising importance of trade with Africa—a pattern that we discuss in more detail below .

Trade around the world today

How much do countries trade, trade openness around the world.

The metric trade as a share of GDP gives us an idea of global integration by capturing all incoming and outgoing transactions of a country.

The charts shows that countries differ a lot in the extent to which they engage in trade. Trade, for example, is much less important to the US economy than for other rich countries.

If you press the play button on the map, you can see changes over time. This reveals that, despite the great variation between countries, there is a common trend: over the last couple of decades trade openness has gone up in most countries.

Exports and imports in real dollars

Expressing the value of trade as a share of GDP tells us the importance of trade in relation to the size of economic activity. Let's now take a look at trade in monetary terms – this tells us the importance of trade in absolute, rather than relative terms.

The chart shows the value of exports (goods plus services) in dollars, country by country.

The main takeaway here is that the trend towards more trade is more pronounced than in the charts showing shares of GDP. This is not surprising: most countries today produce more than a couple of decades ago , and at the same time they trade more of what they produce. 8

What do countries trade?

Trade in goods vs. trade in services.

Trade transactions include goods (tangible products that are physically shipped across borders by road, rail, water, or air) and services (intangible commodities, such as tourism, financial services, and legal advice).

Many traded services make merchandise trade easier or cheaper—for example, shipping services, or insurance and financial services.

Trade in goods has been happening for millennia , while trade in services is a relatively recent phenomenon.

In some countries services are today an important driver of trade: in the UK services account for around half of all exports; and in the Bahamas, almost all exports are services.

In other countries, such as Nigeria and Venezuela, services account for a small share of total exports.

Globally, trade in goods accounts for the majority of trade transactions. But as this chart shows, the share of services in total global exports has slightly increased in recent decades. 9

How are trade partnerships changing?

Bilateral trade is becoming increasingly common.

If we consider all pairs of countries that engage in trade around the world, we find that in the majority of cases, there is a bilateral relationship today: most countries that export goods to a country also import goods from the same country.

The interactive visualization shows this. 10 In the chart, all possible country pairs are partitioned into three categories: the top portion represents the fraction of country pairs that do not trade with one another; the middle portion represents those that trade in both directions (they export to one another); and the bottom portion represents those that trade in one direction only (one country imports from, but does not export to, the other country).

As we can see, bilateral trade is becoming increasingly common (the middle portion has grown substantially). However, many countries still do not trade with each other at all.

South-South trade is becoming increasingly important

The next visualization here shows the share of world merchandise trade that corresponds to exchanges between today's rich countries and the rest of the world.

The 'rich countries' in this chart are: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Cyprus, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom and the United States. 'Non-rich countries' are all the other countries in the world.

As we can see, up until the Second World War, the majority of trade transactions involved exchanges between this small group of rich countries. But this has changed quickly over the last couple of decades, and today, trade between non-rich countries is just as important as trade between rich countries.

In the past two decades, China has been a key driver of this dynamic: the UN Human Development Report (2013) estimates that between 1992 and 2011, China's trade with Sub-Saharan Africa rose from $1 billion to more than $140 billion. 11

The majority of preferential trade agreements are between emerging economies

The last few decades have not only seen an increase in the volume of international trade, but also an increase in the number of preferential trade agreements through which exchanges take place. A preferential trade agreement is a trade pact that reduces tariffs between the participating countries for certain products.

The visualization here shows the evolution of the cumulative number of preferential trade agreements in force worldwide, according to the World Trade Organization (WTO). These numbers include notified and non-notified preferential agreements (the source reports that only about two-thirds of the agreements currently in force have been notified to the WTO) and are disaggregated by country groups.

This figure shows the increasingly important role of trade between developing countries (South-South trade), vis-a-vis trade between developed and developing countries (North-South trade). In the late 1970s, North-South agreements accounted for more than half of all agreements – in 2010, they accounted for about one-quarter. Today, the majority of preferential trade agreements are between developing economies.

Trading patterns have been changing quickly in middle-income countries

An important change in the composition of exported goods in these countries has accompanied the increase in trade among emerging economies over the last half century.

The next visualization plots the share of food exports in each country's total exported merchandise. These figures, produced by the World Bank, correspond to the Standard International Trade Classification, in which 'food' includes, among other goods, live animals, beverages, tobacco, coffee, oils, and fats.

Two points stand out. First, the relative importance of food exports has substantially decreased in most countries since the 1960s (although globally, it has gone up slightly more recently). Second, this decrease has been largest in middle-income countries, particularly in Latin America.

Regarding levels, as one would expect, in high-income countries, food still accounts for a much smaller share of merchandise exports than in most low- and middle-income-countries.

Trade generates efficiency gains

The raw correlation between trade and growth.

Over the last couple of centuries, the world economy has experienced sustained positive economic growth , and over the same period, this process of economic growth has been accompanied by even faster growth in global trade .

In a similar way, if we look at country-level data from the last half century we find that there is also a correlation between economic growth and trade: countries with higher rates of GDP growth also tend to have higher rates of growth in trade as a share of output. This basic correlation is shown in the chart here, where we plot the average annual change in real GDP per capita, against growth in trade (average annual change in value of exports as a share of GDP). 12

Is this statistical association between economic output and trade causal?

Among the potential growth-enhancing factors that may come from greater global economic integration are: competition (firms that fail to adopt new technologies and cut costs are more likely to fail and be replaced by more dynamic firms); economies of scale (firms that can export to the world face larger demand, and under the right conditions, they can operate at larger scales where the price per unit of product is lower); learning and innovation (firms that trade gain more experience and exposure to develop and adopt technologies and industry standards from foreign competitors). 13

Are these mechanisms supported by the data? Let's take a look at the available empirical evidence.

Evidence from cross-country differences in trade, growth, and productivity

When it comes to academic studies estimating the impact of trade on GDP growth, the most cited paper is Frankel and Romer (1999). 14

In this study, Frankel and Romer used geography as a proxy for trade to estimate the impact of trade on growth. This is a classic example of the so-called instrumental variables approach . The idea is that a country's geography is fixed, and mainly affects national income through trade. So if we observe that a country's distance from other countries is a powerful predictor of economic growth (after accounting for other characteristics), then the conclusion is drawn that it must be because trade has an effect on economic growth. Following this logic, Frankel and Romer find evidence of a strong impact of trade on economic growth.

Other papers have applied the same approach to richer cross-country data, and they have found similar results. A key example is Alcalá and Ciccone (2004). 15

This body of evidence suggests trade is indeed one of the factors driving national average incomes (GDP per capita) and macroeconomic productivity (GDP per worker) over the long run. 16

Evidence from changes in labor productivity at the firm level

If trade is causally linked to economic growth, we would expect that trade liberalization episodes also lead to firms becoming more productive in the medium and even short run. There is evidence suggesting this is often the case.

Pavcnik (2002) examined the effects of liberalized trade on plant productivity in the case of Chile, during the late 1970s and early 1980s. She found a positive impact on firm productivity in the import-competing sector. She also found evidence of aggregate productivity improvements from the reshuffling of resources and output from less to more efficient producers. 17

Bloom, Draca, and Van Reenen (2016) examined the impact of rising Chinese import competition on European firms over the period 1996-2007 and obtained similar results. They found that innovation increased more in those firms most affected by Chinese imports. They also found evidence of efficiency gains through two related channels: innovation increased and new existing technologies were adopted within firms, and aggregate productivity also increased because employment was reallocated towards more technologically advanced firms. 18

Trade does not only increase efficiency gains

Overall, the available evidence suggests that trade liberalization does improve economic efficiency. This evidence comes from different political and economic contexts and includes both micro and macro measures of efficiency.

This result is important because it shows that there are gains from trade. But of course, efficiency is not the only relevant consideration here. As we discuss in a companion article , the efficiency gains from trade are not generally equally shared by everyone. The evidence from the impact of trade on firm productivity confirms this: "reshuffling workers from less to more efficient producers" means closing down some jobs in some places. Because distributional concerns are real it is important to promote public policies – such as unemployment benefits and other safety-net programs – that help redistribute the gains from trade.

Trade has distributional consequences

The conceptual link between trade and household welfare.

When a country opens up to trade, the demand and supply of goods and services in the economy shift. As a consequence, local markets respond, and prices change. This has an impact on households, both as consumers and as wage earners.

The implication is that trade has an impact on everyone. It's not the case that the effects are restricted to workers from industries in the trade sector; or to consumers who buy imported goods. The effects of trade extend to everyone because markets are interlinked, so imports and exports have knock-on effects on all prices in the economy, including those in non-traded sectors.

Economists usually distinguish between "general equilibrium consumption effects" (i.e. changes in consumption that arise from the fact that trade affects the prices of non-traded goods relative to traded goods) and "general equilibrium income effects" (i.e. changes in wages that arise from the fact that trade has an impact on the demand for specific types of workers, who could be employed in both the traded and non-traded sectors).

Considering all these complex interrelations, it's not surprising that economic theories predict that not everyone will benefit from international trade in the same way. The distribution of the gains from trade depends on what different groups of people consume, and which types of jobs they have, or could have. 19

The link between trade, jobs and wages

Evidence from chinese imports and their impact on factory workers in the us.

The most famous study looking at this question is Autor, Dorn and Hanson (2013): "The China syndrome: Local labor market effects of import competition in the United States". 20

In this paper, Autor and coauthors examined how local labor markets changed in the parts of the country most exposed to Chinese competition. They found that rising exposure increased unemployment, lowered labor force participation, and reduced wages. Additionally, they found that claims for unemployment and healthcare benefits also increased in more trade-exposed labor markets.

The visualization here is one of the key charts from their paper. It's a scatter plot of cross-regional exposure to rising imports, against changes in employment. Each dot is a small region (a 'commuting zone' to be precise). The vertical position of the dots represents the percent change in manufacturing employment for the working-age population, and the horizontal position represents the predicted exposure to rising imports (exposure varies across regions depending on the local weight of different industries).

The trend line in this chart shows a negative relationship: more exposure goes along with less employment. There are large deviations from the trend (there are some low-exposure regions with big negative changes in employment); but the paper provides more sophisticated regressions and robustness checks, and finds that this relationship is statistically significant.

This result is important because it shows that the labor market adjustments were large. Many workers and communities were affected over a long period of time. 21

But it's also important to keep in mind that Autor and colleagues are only giving us a partial perspective on the total effect of trade on employment. In particular, comparing changes in employment at the regional level misses the fact that firms operate in multiple regions and industries at the same time. Indeed, Ildikó Magyari found evidence suggesting the Chinese trade shock provided incentives for US firms to diversify and reorganize production. 22

So companies that outsourced jobs to China often ended up closing some lines of business, but at the same time expanded other lines elsewhere in the US. This means that job losses in some regions subsidized new jobs in other parts of the country.

On the whole, Magyari finds that although Chinese imports may have reduced employment within some establishments, these losses were more than offset by gains in employment within the same firms in other places. This is no consolation to people who lost their jobs. But it is necessary to add this perspective to the simplistic story of "trade with China is bad for US workers".

Evidence from the expansion of trade in India and the impact on poverty reductions

Another important paper in this field is Topalova (2010): "Factor immobility and regional impacts of trade liberalization: Evidence on poverty from India". 23

In this paper, Topalova examines the impact of trade liberalization on poverty across different regions in India, using the sudden and extensive change in India's trade policy in 1991. She finds that rural regions that were more exposed to liberalization experienced a slower decline in poverty and lower consumption growth.

Analyzing the mechanisms underlying this effect, Topalova finds that liberalization had a stronger negative impact among the least geographically mobile at the bottom of the income distribution and in places where labor laws deterred workers from reallocating across sectors.

The evidence from India shows that (i) discussions that only look at "winners" in poor countries and "losers" in rich countries miss the point that the gains from trade are unequally distributed within both sets of countries; and (ii) context-specific factors, like worker mobility across sectors and geographic regions, are crucial to understand the impact of trade on incomes.

Evidence from other studies

• Donaldson (2018) uses archival data from colonial India to estimate the impact of India’s vast railroad network. He finds railroads increased trade, and in doing so they increased real incomes (and reduced income volatility). 24
• Porto (2006) looks at the distributional effects of Mercosur on Argentine families, and finds this regional trade agreement led to benefits across the entire income distribution. He finds the effect was progressive: poor households gained more than middle-income households because prior to the reform, trade protection benefitted the rich disproportionately. 25
• Trefler (2004) looks at the Canada-US Free Trade Agreement and finds there was a group who bore "adjustment costs" (displaced workers and struggling plants) and a group who enjoyed "long-run gains" (consumers and efficient plants). 26

The link between trade and the cost of living

The fact that trade negatively affects labor market opportunities for specific groups of people does not necessarily imply that trade has a negative aggregate effect on household welfare. This is because, while trade affects wages and employment, it also affects the prices of consumption goods. So households are affected both as consumers and as wage earners.

Most studies focus on the earnings channel and try to approximate the impact of trade on welfare by looking at how much wages can buy, using as a reference the changing prices of a fixed basket of goods.

This approach is problematic because it fails to consider welfare gains from increased product variety, and obscures complicated distributional issues such as the fact that poor and rich individuals consume different baskets so they benefit differently from changes in relative prices. 27

Ideally, studies looking at the impact of trade on household welfare should rely on fine-grained data on prices, consumption, and earnings. This is the approach followed in Atkin, Faber, and Gonzalez-Navarro (2018): "Retail globalization and household welfare: Evidence from Mexico". 28

Atkin and coauthors use a uniquely rich dataset from Mexico, and find that the arrival of global retail chains led to reductions in the incomes of traditional retail sector workers, but had little impact on average municipality-level incomes or employment; and led to lower costs of living for both rich and poor households.

The chart here shows the estimated distribution of total welfare gains across the household income distribution (the light-gray lines correspond to confidence intervals). These are proportional gains expressed as a percent of initial household income.

As we can see, there is a net positive welfare effect across all income groups; but these improvements in welfare are regressive, in the sense that richer households gain proportionally more (about 7.5 percent gain compared to 5 percent). 29

Evidence from other countries confirms this is not an isolated case – the expenditure channel really seems to be an important and understudied source of household welfare. Giuseppe Berlingieri, Holger Breinlich, Swati Dhingra, for example, investigated the consumer benefits from trade agreements implemented by the EU between 1993 and 2013; and they found that these trade agreements increased the quality of available products, which translated into a cumulative reduction in consumer prices equivalent to savings of €24 billion per year for EU consumers. 30

Implications of trade’s distributional effects

The available evidence shows that, for some groups of people, trade has a negative effect on wages and employment opportunities; at the same time, it has a large positive effect via lower consumer prices and increased product availability.

Two points are worth emphasizing.

For some households, the net effect is positive. But for some households that's not the case. In particular, workers who lose their jobs can be affected for extended periods of time, so the positive effect via lower prices is not enough to compensate them for the reduction in earnings.

On the whole, if we aggregate changes in welfare across households, the net effect is usually positive. But this is hardly a consolation for the worse off.

This highlights a complex reality: There are aggregate gains from trade , but there are also real distributional concerns. Even if trade is not a major driver of income inequalities , it's important to keep in mind that public policies, such as unemployment benefits and other safety-net programs, can and should help redistribute the gains from trade.

Explaining trade patterns: Theory and Evidence

Comparative advantage, theory: what is 'comparative advantage' and why does it matter to understand trade.

In economic theory, the 'economic cost' – or the 'opportunity cost' – of producing a good is the value of everything you need to give up in order to produce that good.

Economic costs include physical inputs (the value of the stuff you use to produce the good), plus forgone opportunities (when you allocate scarce resources to a task, you give up alternative uses of those resources).

A country or a person is said to have a 'comparative advantage' if it can produce something at a lower opportunity cost than its trade partners.

The forgone opportunities of production are key to understanding this concept. It is precisely this that distinguishes absolute advantage from comparative advantage.

To see the difference between comparative and absolute advantage, consider a commercial aviation pilot and a baker. Suppose the pilot is an excellent chef, and she can bake just as well, or even better than the baker. In this case, the pilot has an absolute advantage in both tasks. Yet the baker probably has a comparative advantage in baking, because the opportunity cost of baking is much higher for the pilot.

The freely available economics textbook The Economy: Economics for a Changing World explains this as follows: "A person or country has comparative advantage in the production of a particular good, if the cost of producing an additional unit of that good relative to the cost of producing another good is lower than another person or country’s cost to produce the same two goods."

At the individual level, comparative advantage explains why you might want to delegate tasks to someone else, even if you can do those tasks better and faster than them. This may sound counterintuitive, but it is not: If you are good at many things, it means that investing time in one task has a high opportunity cost, because you are not doing the other amazing things you could be doing with your time and resources. So, at least from an efficiency point of view, you should specialize on what you are best at, and delegate the rest.

The same logic applies to countries. Broadly speaking, the principle of comparative advantage postulates that all nations can gain from trade if each specializes in producing what they are relatively more efficient at producing, and imports the rest: “do what you do best, import the rest”. 31

In countries with a relative abundance of certain factors of production, the theory of comparative advantage predicts that they will export goods that rely heavily upon those factors: a country typically has a comparative advantage in those goods that use its abundant resources. Colombia exports bananas to Europe because it has comparatively abundant tropical weather.

Is there empirical support for comparative-advantage theories of trade?

The empirical evidence suggests that the principle of comparative advantage does help explain trade patterns. Bernhofen and Brown (2004) 32 , for instance, provide evidence using the experience of Japan. Specifically, they exploit Japan’s dramatic nineteenth-century move from a state of near complete isolation to wide trade openness.

The graph here shows the price changes of the key tradable goods after the opening up to trade. It presents a scatter diagram of the net exports in 1869 graphed in relation to the change in prices from 1851–53 to 1869. As we can see, this is consistent with the theory: after opening to trade, the relative prices of major exports such as silk increased (Japan exported what was cheap for them to produce and which was valuable abroad), while the relative price of imports such as sugar declined (they imported what was relatively more difficult for them to produce, but was cheap abroad).

Trade diminishes with distance

The resistance that geography imposes on trade has long been studied in the empirical economics literature – and the main conclusion is that trade intensity is strongly linked to geographic distance.

The visualization, from Eaton and Kortum (2002), graphs 'normalized import shares' against distance. 33 Each dot represents a country pair from a set of 19 OECD countries, and both the vertical and horizontal axes are expressed on logarithmic scales.

The 'normalized import shares' in the vertical axis provide a measure of how much each country imports from different partners (see the paper for details on how this is calculated and normalized), while the distance in the horizontal axis corresponds to the distance between central cities in each country (see the paper and references therein for details on the list of cities). As we can see, there is a strong negative relationship. Trade diminishes with distance. Through econometric modeling, the paper shows that this relationship is not just a correlation driven by other factors: their findings suggest that distance imposes a significant barrier to trade.

The fact that trade diminishes with distance is also corroborated by data on trade intensity within countries. The visualization here shows, through a series of maps, the geographic distribution of French firms that export to France's neighboring countries. The colors reflect the percentage of firms that export to each specific country.

As we can see, the share of firms exporting to each of the corresponding neighbors is the largest close to the border. The authors also show in the paper that this pattern holds for the value of individual-firm exports – trade value decreases with distance to the border.

Institutions

Conducting international trade requires both financial and non-financial institutions to support transactions. Some of these institutions are fairly obvious (e.g. law enforcement); but some are less obvious. For example, the evidence shows that producers in exporting countries often need credit in order to engage in trade.

The scatter plot, from Manova (2013), shows the correlation between levels in private credit (specifically exporters’ private credit as a share of GDP) and exports (average log bilateral exports across destinations and sectors). 35 As can be seen, financially developed economies – those with more dynamic private credit markets – typically outperform exporters with less evolved financial institutions.

Other studies have shown that country-specific institutions, like the knowledge of foreign languages, for instance, are also important to promote foreign relative to domestic trade. 36

Increasing returns to scale

The concept of comparative advantage predicts that if all countries had identical endowments and institutions, there would be little incentive for specialization because the opportunity cost of producing any good would be the same in every country.

So you may wonder: why is it then the case that in the last few years, we have seen such rapid growth in intra-industry trade between rich countries?

The increase in intra-industry between rich countries seems paradoxical under the light of comparative advantage because in recent decades we have seen convergence in key factors, such as human capital , across these countries.

The solution to the paradox is actually not very complicated: Comparative advantage is one, but not the only force driving incentives to specialization and trade.

Several economists, most notably Paul Krugman, have developed theories of trade in which trade is not due to differences between countries, but instead due to "increasing returns to scale" – an economic term used to denote a technology in which producing extra units of a good becomes cheaper if you operate at a larger scale.

The idea is that specialization allows countries to reap greater economies of scale (i.e. to reduce production costs by focusing on producing large quantities of specific products), so trade can be a good idea even if the countries do not differ in endowments, including culture and institutions.

These models of trade, often referred to as “New Trade Theory”, are helpful in explaining why in the last few years we have seen such rapid growth in two-way exchanges of goods within industries between developed nations.

In a much-cited paper, Evenett and Keller (2002) show that both factor endowments and increasing returns help explain production and trade patterns around the world. 37

You can learn more about New Trade Theory, and the empirical support behind it, in Paul Krugman's Nobel lecture .

Measurement and data quality

There are dozens of official sources of data on international trade, and if you compare these different sources, you will find that they do not agree with one another. Even if you focus on what seems to be the same indicator for the same year in the same country, discrepancies are large.

Such differences between sources can also be found in rich countries where statistical agencies tend to follow international reporting guidelines more closely.

There are also large bilateral discrepancies within sources: the value of goods that country A exports to country B can be more than the value of goods that country B imports from country A.

Here we explain how international trade data is collected and processed, and why there are such large discrepancies.

What data is available?

The data hubs from several large international organizations publish and maintain extensive cross-country datasets on international trade. Here's a list of the most important ones:

• World Bank Open Data
• WTO Statistics
• UN Comtrade
• UNCTAD World Integrated Trade Solutions

In addition to these sources, there are also many other academic projects that publish data on international trade. These projects tend to rely on data from one or more of the sources above, and they typically process and merge series in order to improve coverage and consistency. Three important sources are:

• The Correlates of War Project . 38
• The NBER-United Nations Trade Dataset Project .
• The CEPII Bilateral Trade and Gravity Data Project . 39

How large are the discrepancies between sources?

In the visualization here, we compare the data published by several of the sources listed above, country by country, from 1955 to today.

For each country, we exclude trade in services, and we focus only on estimates of the total value of exported goods, expressed as shares of GDP. 40

As this chart clearly shows, different data sources often tell very different stories. If you change the country or region shown you will see that this is true, to varying degrees, across all countries and years.

Constructing this chart was demanding. It required downloading trade data from many different sources, collecting the relevant series, and then standardizing them so that the units of measure and the geographical territories were consistent.

All series, except the two long-run series from CEPII and NBER-UN, were produced from data published by the sources in current US dollars and then converted to GDP shares using a unique source (World Bank).

So, if all series are in the same units (share of national GDP) and they measure the same thing (value of goods exported from one country to the rest of the world), what explains the differences?

Let's dig deeper to understand what's going on.

Why doesn't the data add up?

Differences in guidelines used by countries to record and report trade data.

Broadly speaking, there are two main approaches used to estimate international merchandise trade:

• The first approach relies on estimating trade from customs records , often complementing or correcting figures with data from enterprise surveys and administrative records associated with taxation. The main manual providing guidelines for this approach is the International Merchandise Trade Statistics Manual (IMTS).
• The second approach relies on estimating trade from macroeconomic data , typically National Accounts . The main manual providing guidelines for this approach is the Balance of Payments and International Investment Position Manual (BPM6), which was drafted in parallel with the 2008 System of National Accounts of the United Nations (SNA 2008). The idea behind this approach is to record changes in economic ownership. 41

Under these two approaches, it is common to distinguish between 'traded merchandise' and 'traded goods'. The distinction is often made because goods simply being transported through a country (i.e., goods in transit) are not considered to change a country's stock of material resources and are hence often excluded from the more narrow concept of 'merchandise trade'.

Also, adding to the complexity, countries often rely on measurement protocols developed alongside approaches and concepts that are not perfectly compatible to begin with. In Europe, for example, countries use the 'Compilers guide on European statistics on international trade in goods'.

Measurement error and other inconsistencies

Even when two sources rely on the same broad accounting approach, discrepancies arise because countries fail to adhere perfectly to the protocols.

In theory, for example, the exports of country A to country B should mirror the imports of country B from country A. But in practice this is rarely the case because of differences in valuation. According to the BPM6, imports, and exports should be recorded in the balance of payments accounts on a ' free on board (FOB) basis', which means using prices that include all charges up to placing the goods on board a ship at the port of departure. Yet many countries stick to FOB values only for exports, and use CIF values for imports (CIF stands for 'Cost, Insurance and Freight', and includes the costs of transportation). 42

The chart here gives you an idea of how large import-export asymmetries are. Shown are the differences between the value of goods that each country reports exporting to the US, and the value of goods that the US reports importing from the same countries. For example, for China, the figure in the chart corresponds to the “Value of merchandise imports in the US from China” minus the “Value of merchandise exports from China to the US”.

The differences in the chart here, which are both positive and negative, suggest that there is more going on than differences in FOB vs. CIF values. If all asymmetries were coming from FOB-CIF differences, then we should only see positive values in the chart (recall that, unlike FOB values, CIF values include the cost of transportation, so CIF values are larger).

What else may be going on here?

Another common source of measurement error relates to the inconsistent attribution of trade partners. An example is failure to follow the guidelines on how to treat goods passing through intermediary countries for processing or merchanting purposes. As global production chains become more complex, countries find it increasingly difficult to unambiguously establish the origin and final destination of merchandise, even when rules are established in the manuals. 43

And there are still more potential sources of discrepancies. For example differences in customs and tax regimes, and differences between "general" and "special" trade systems (i.e. differences between statistical territories and actual country borders, which do not often coincide because of things like 'custom free zones'). 44

Even when two sources have identical trade estimates, inconsistencies in published data can arise from differences in exchange rates. If a dataset reports cross-country trade data in US dollars, estimates will vary depending on the exchange rates used. Different exchange rates will lead to conflicting estimates, even if figures in local currency units are consistent.

A checklist for comparing sources

Asymmetries in international trade statistics are large and arise for a variety of reasons. These include conceptual inconsistencies across measurement standards and inconsistencies in the way countries apply agreed-upon protocols. Here's a checklist of issues to keep in mind when comparing sources.

• Differences in underlying records: is trade measured from National Accounts data rather than directly from custom or tax records?
• Differences in import and export valuations: are transactions valued at FOB or CIF prices?
• Inconsistent attribution of trade partners: how is the origin and final destination of merchandise established?
• Difference between 'goods' and 'merchandise': how are re-importing, re-exporting, and intermediary merchanting transactions recorded?
• Exchange rates: how are values converted from local currency units to the currency that allows international comparisons (most often the US-$)?
• Differences between 'general' and 'special' trade system: how is trade recorded for custom-free zones?
• Other issues: Time of recording, confidentiality policies, product classification, deliberate mis-invoicing for illicit purposes.

Many organizations producing trade data have long recognized these factors. Indeed, international organizations often incorporate corrections in an attempt to improve data quality.

The OECD's Balanced International Merchandise Trade Statistics , for example, uses its own approach to correct and reconcile international merchandise trade statistics. 45

The corrections applied in the OECD's 'balanced' series make this the best source for cross-country comparisons. However, this dataset has low coverage across countries, and it only goes back to 2011. This is an important obstacle since the complex adjustments introduced by the OECD imply we can't easily improve coverage by appending data from other sources. At Our World in Data we have chosen to rely on CEPII as the main source for exploring long-run changes in international trade, but we also rely on World Bank and OECD data for up-to-date cross-country comparisons.

There are two key lessons from all of this. The first lesson is that, for most users of trade data out there, there is no obvious way of choosing between sources. And the second lesson is that, because of statistical glitches, researchers and policymakers should always take analyses of trade data with a pinch of salt. For example, in a recent high-profile report , researchers attributed mismatches in bilateral trade data to illicit financial flows through trade mis-invoicing (or trade-based money laundering). As we show here, this interpretation of the data is not appropriate, since mismatches in the data can, and often do arise from measurement inconsistencies rather than malfeasance. 46

Hopefully, the discussion and checklist above can help researchers better interpret and choose between conflicting data sources.

Interactive charts on Trade and Globalization

The openness index, when calculated for the world as a whole, includes double-counting of transactions: When country A sells goods to country B, this shows up in the data both as an import (B imports from A) and as an export (A sells to B).

Indeed, if you compare the chart showing the global trade openness index and the chart showing global merchandise exports as a share of GDP , you find that the former is almost twice as large as the latter.

Why is the global openness index not exactly twice the value reported in the chart plotting global merchandise exports? There a three reasons.

First, the global openness index uses different sources. Second, the global openness index includes trade in goods and services, while merchandise exports include goods but not services. And third, the amount that country A reports exporting to country B does not usually match the amount that B reports importing from A.

We explore this in more detail in our measurement section below .

Klasing and Milionis (2014), one of the sources in the chart, published an additional set of estimates under an alternative specification. Similarly, for the period 1960-2015, the World Bank's World Development Indicators published an alternative set of estimates similar but not identical to those included from the Penn World Tables (9.1). You find all these alternative overlapping sources in this comparison chart .

Leonor Freire Costa, Nuno Palma, and Jaime Reis (2015) – The great escape? The contribution of the empire to Portugal's economic growth, 1500–1800 Leonor Freire Costa Nuno Palma Jaime Reis European Review of Economic History, Volume 19, Issue 1, 1 February 2015, Pages 1–22, https://doi.org/10.1093/ereh/heu019

Broadberry and O'Rourke (2010) - The Cambridge Economic History of Modern Europe: Volume 2, 1870 to the Present. Cambridge University Press.

Integration in the goods markets is measured here through the 'trade openness index', which is defined by the sum of exports and imports as a share of GDP. In our interactive chart you can explore trends in trade openness over this period for a selection of European countries.

Broadberry and O'Rourke (2010) - The Cambridge Economic History of Modern Europe: Volume 2, 1870 to the Present. Cambridge University Press. The graph depicts the “evolution of three indicators measuring integration in commodity, labor, and capital markets over the long run. Commodity market integration is measured by computing the ratio of exports to GDP. Labor market integration is measured by dividing the migratory turnover by population. Financial integration is measured using Feldstein–Horioka estimators of current account disconnectedness.”

We also have the same chart but showing imports .

We also have the same chart, but showing imports .

This interactive chart shows trade in services as a share of GDP across countries and regions.

This chart was inspired by a chart from Helpman, E., Melitz, M., & Rubinstein, Y. (2007). Estimating trade flows: Trading partners and trading volumes (No. w12927). National Bureau of Economic Research.

We also have the same data, but as a stacked-area chart .

There are different ways of capturing this correlation. I focus here on all countries with data over the period 1945-2014. You can find a similar chart using different data sources and time periods in Ventura, J. (2005). A global view of economic growth. Handbook of economic growth, 1, 1419-1497. Online here .

The textbook The Economy: Economics for a Changing World explains this in more detail.

Frankel, J. A., & Romer, D. H. (1999). Does trade cause growth? American Economic Review, 89(3), 379-399.

Alcalá, F., & Ciccone, A. (2004). Trade and productivity . The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 119(2), 613-646.

There are many papers that try to answer this specific question with macro data. For an overview of papers and methods see: Durlauf, S. N., Johnson, P. A., & Temple, J. R. (2005). Growth econometrics. Handbook of economic growth, 1, 555-677.

Pavcnik, N. (2002). Trade liberalization, exit, and productivity improvements: Evidence from Chilean plants . The Review of Economic Studies, 69(1), 245-276.

Bloom, N., Draca, M., & Van Reenen, J. (2016). Trade induced technical change? The impact of Chinese imports on innovation, IT and productivity. The Review of Economic Studies, 83(1), 87-117. Available online here .

You can read more about these economic concepts, and the related predictions from economic theory, in Chapter 18 of the textbook The Economy: Economics for a Changing World .

David, H., Dorn, D., & Hanson, G. H. (2013). The China syndrome: Local labor market effects of import competition in the United States . American Economic Review, 103(6), 2121-68.

It's important to mention here that the economist Jonathan Rothwell wrote a paper suggesting these findings are the result of a statistical illusion. Rothwell's critique received some attention from the media , but Autor and coauthors provided a reply , which I think successfully refutes this claim.

Magyari, I. (2017). Firm Reorganization, Chinese Imports, and US Manufacturing Employment . US Census Bureau, Center for Economic Studies.

Topalova, P. (2010). Factor immobility and regional impacts of trade liberalization: Evidence on poverty from India . American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 2(4), 1-41.

Donaldson, D. (2018). Railroads of the Raj: Estimating the impact of transportation infrastructure . American Economic Review, 108(4-5), 899-934.

Porto, G (2006). Using Survey Data to Assess the Distributional Effects of Trade Policy. Journal of International Economics 70 (2006) 140–160.

Trefler, D. (2004). The long and short of the Canada-US free trade agreement . American Economic Review, 94(4), 870-895.

See: (i) Feenstra, R. C., & Weinstein, D. E. (2017). Globalization, markups, and US welfare . Journal of Political Economy, 125(4), 1040-1074. (ii) Fajgelbaum, P. D., & Khandelwal, A. K. (2016). Measuring the unequal gains from trade . The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 131(3), 1113-1180.

Atkin, David, Benjamin Faber, and Marco Gonzalez-Navarro. "Retail globalization and household welfare: Evidence from Mexico." Journal of Political Economy 126.1 (2018): 1-73.

In the paper, Atkin and coauthors explore the reasons for this and find that the regressive nature of the distribution is mainly due to richer households placing higher weight on the product variety and shopping amenities on offer at these new foreign stores.

Berlingieri, G., Breinlich, H., & Dhingra, S. (2018). The Impact of Trade Agreements on Consumer Welfare—Evidence from the EU Common External Trade Policy. Journal of the European Economic Association.

Nobel laureate Paul Samuelson (1969) was once challenged by the mathematician Stanislaw Ulam: "Name me one proposition in all of the social sciences which is both true and non-trivial." It was several years later than he thought of the correct response: comparative advantage. "That it is logically true need not be argued before a mathematician; that is is not trivial is attested by the thousands of important and intelligent men who have never been able to grasp the doctrine for themselves or to believe it after it was explained to them."

(NB. This is an excerpt from https://www.wto.org/english/res_e/reser_e/cadv_e.htm)

Bernhofen, D., & Brown, J. (2004). A Direct Test of the Theory of Comparative Advantage: The Case of Japan. Journal of Political Economy, 112(1), 48-67. doi:1. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/379944 doi:1

Eaton, J., & Kortum, S. (2002). Technology, geography, and trade. Econometrica, 70(5), 1741-1779.

Crozet, M., & Koenig, P. (2010). Structural Gravity Equations with Intensive and Extensive Margins. The Canadian Journal of Economics / Revue Canadienne D'Economique, 43(1), 41-62. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/40389555

Manova, Kalina. "Credit constraints, heterogeneous firms, and international trade." The Review of Economic Studies 80.2 (2013): 711-744.

Melitz, J. (2008). Language and foreign trade. European Economic Review, 52(4), 667-699.

Evenett, S. J., & Keller, W. (2002). On theories explaining the success of the gravity equation . Journal of Political Economy, 110(2), 281-316.

For more information on how the COW trade datasets were constructed see: (i) Barbieri, Katherine, and Omar M. G. Omar Keshk. 2016. Correlates of War Project Trade Data Set Codebook, Version 4.0. Available at http://correlatesofwar.org and (ii) Barbieri, Katherine, Omar M. G. Keshk, and Brian Pollins. 2009. TRADING DATA: Evaluating our Assumptions and Coding Rules. Conflict Management and Peace Science, 26(5): 471–491.

Further information on CEPII's methodology can be found in their working paper .

The chart includes series labeled by the sources as 'merchandise trade' and 'goods trade'. As we explain below, part of the asymmetries in trade data comes from the fact that, although 'merchandise' and 'goods' are equivalent in the dictionary, these two terms often measure related but different things.

For example, if there is no change in ownership (e.g. a firm exports goods to its factory in another country for processing, and then re-imports the processed goods) the manual says that statistical agencies should only record the net difference in value. You can find more details about this in an OECD Statistics Briefing .

This issue is actually also a source of disagreement between National Accounts data and customs data. You can read more about it in this report: Harrison, Anne (2013) FOB/CIF Issue in Merchandise Trade/Transport of Goods in BPM6 and the 2008 SNA, Twenty-Fifth Meeting of the IMF Committee on Balance of Payments Statistics, Washington, D.C .

Precisely because of the difficulty that arises when trying to establish the origin and final destination of merchandise, some sources distinguish between national and dyadic (i.e. 'directed') trade estimates.

For more details about general and special trade see the Eurostat glossary .

The OECD approach consists of four steps, which they describe as follows: "First, data are collected and organized, and imports are converted to FOB prices to match the valuation of exports. Secondly, data are adjusted for several specific large problems known to drive asymmetries. Presently these include “modular” adjustments for unallocated and confidential trade; for exports by Hong Kong, China; for Swiss non-monetary gold; and for clear-cut cases of product misclassifications. The list of modules is expected to grow over time. In the third step, adjusted data are balanced using a “Symmetry Index” that weights exports and imports. As the final step, the data are also converted to Classification of Products by Activity (CPA) products to better align with National Accounts statistics, such as in national Supply-Use tables." You can read more about it here . In addition to the OECD, other sources also use corrections. The IMF's DOTS dataset, for example, uses a 6 percent rule for converting import valuations (in CIF) into export values (in FOB). More information can be found in the IMF's (2018) working paper on 'New Estimates for Direction of Trade Statistics'.

For more details on this see Forstater, M. (2018) Illicit Financial Flows, Trade Misinvoicing, and Multinational Tax Avoidance: The Same or Different? , CGD Policy Paper 123.

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Globalization and Economic Growth

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• Ishak Demir 7 , 10 ,
• Mehmet Canakci 8 &
• Taha Egri 9  

Part of the book series: Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals ((ENUNSDG))

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Economic Growth , Integration and growth , Economic development.

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Globalization, or the increased interconnectedness and interdependence of peoples, companies, institutions and countries. It is generally understood to include two inter-related elements: the opening of international borders to increasingly fast flows of goods, services, finance, investment, people, information, ideas and technology; and the changes in institutions and policies at national and international levels that facilitate or promote such flows (WHO 2020 ). Globalization process has impacts on economies, prosperity, development of societies, political systems, environment, and cultures around the world.

Economic globalization can be defined as the increasing interdependence of world economies as a result of the growing scale of cross-border trade of commodities and services, flow of international capital and wide and rapid spread of technologies. It reflects the continuing expansion and mutual...

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Demir, I., Canakci, M., Egri, T. (2021). Globalization and Economic Growth. In: Leal Filho, W., Azul, A.M., Brandli, L., Lange Salvia, A., Wall, T. (eds) Decent Work and Economic Growth. Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71058-7_90-1

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18.3: Globalization and the Economy

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What Is Globalization?

Globalization refers to the process of integrating governments, cultures, and financial markets through international trade into a single world market. Often, the process begins with a single motive, such as market expansion (on the part of a corporation) or increased access to healthcare (on the part of a nonprofit organization). But usually there is a snowball effect, and globalization becomes a mixed bag of economic, philanthropic, entrepreneurial, and cultural efforts. Sometimes the efforts have obvious benefits, even for those who worry about cultural colonialism, such as campaigns to bring clean-water technology to rural areas that do not have access to safe drinking water.

Instant communications have allowed many international corporations to move parts of their businesses to countries such as India, where their costs are lowest. (Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

Other globalization efforts, however, are more complex. Let us look, for example, at the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The agreement is among the countries of North America, including Canada, the United States, and Mexico and allows much freer trade opportunities without the kind of tariffs (taxes) and import laws that restrict international trade. Often, trade opportunities are misrepresented by politicians and economists, who sometimes offer them up as a panacea to economic woes. For example, trade can lead to both increases and decreases in job opportunities. This is because while easier, more lax export laws mean there is the potential for job growth in the United States, imports can mean the exact opposite. As the United States import more goods from outside the country, jobs typically decrease, as more and more products are made overseas.

Many prominent economists believed that when NAFTA was created in 1994 it would lead to major gains in jobs. But by 2010, the evidence showed an opposite impact; the data showed 682,900 U.S. jobs lost across all states (Parks 2011). While NAFTA did increase the flow of goods and capital across the northern and southern U.S. borders, it also increased unemployment in Mexico, which spurred greater amounts of illegal immigration motivated by a search for work.

There are several forces driving globalization, including the global economy and multinational corporations that control assets, sales, production, and employment (United Nations 1973). Characteristics of multinational corporations include the following: A large share of their capital is collected from a variety of different nations, their business is conducted without regard to national borders, they concentrate wealth in the hands of core nations and already wealthy individuals, and they play a key role in the global economy.

We see the emergence of global assembly lines, where products are assembled over the course of several international transactions. For instance, Apple designs its next-generation Mac prototype in the United States, components are made in various peripheral nations, they are then shipped to another peripheral nation such as Malaysia for assembly, and tech support is outsourced to India.

Globalization has also led to the development of global commodity chains, where internationally integrated economic links connect workers and corporations for the purpose of manufacture and marketing (Plahe 2005). For example, in maquiladoras , mostly found in northern Mexico, workers may sew imported precut pieces of fabric into garments.

Globalization also brings an international division of labor, in which comparatively wealthy workers from core nations compete with the low-wage labor pool of peripheral and semi-peripheral nations. This can lead to a sense of xenophobia, which is an illogical fear and even hatred of foreigners and foreign goods. Corporations trying to maximize their profits in the United States are conscious of this risk and attempt to “Americanize” their products, selling shirts printed with U.S. flags that were nevertheless made in Mexico.

Aspects of Globalization

Globalized trade is nothing new. Societies in ancient Greece and Rome traded with other societies in Africa, the Middle East, India, and China. Trade expanded further during the Islamic Golden Age and after the rise of the Mongol Empire. The establishment of colonial empires after the voyages of discovery by European countries meant that trade was going on all over the world. In the nineteenth century, the Industrial Revolution led to even more trade of ever-increasing amounts of goods. However, the advance of technology, especially communications, after World War II and the Cold War triggered the explosive acceleration in the process occurring today.

One way to look at the similarities and differences that exist among the economies of different nations is to compare their standards of living. The statistic most commonly used to do this is the domestic process per capita. This is the gross domestic product, or GDP, of a country divided by its population. The table below compares the top 11 countries with the bottom 11 out of the 228 countries listed in the CIA World Factbook .

There are benefits and drawbacks to globalization. Some of the benefits include the exponentially accelerated progress of development, the creation of international awareness and empowerment, and the potential for increased wealth (Abedian 2002). However, experience has shown that countries can also be weakened by globalization. Some critics of globalization worry about the growing influence of enormous international financial and industrial corporations that benefit the most from free trade and unrestricted markets. They fear these corporations can use their vast wealth and resources to control governments to act in their interest rather than that of the local population (Bakan 2004). Indeed, when looking at the countries at the bottom of the list above, we are looking at places where the primary benefactors of mineral exploitation are major corporations and a few key political figures.

Other critics oppose globalization for what they see as negative impacts on the environment and local economies. Rapid industrialization, often a key component of globalization, can lead to widespread economic damage due to the lack of regulatory environment (Speth 2003). Further, as there are often no social institutions in place to protect workers in countries where jobs are scarce, some critics state that globalization leads to weak labor movements (Boswell and Stevis 1997). Finally, critics are concerned that wealthy countries can force economically weaker nations to open their markets while protecting their own local products from competition (Wallerstein 1974). This can be particularly true of agricultural products, which are often one of the main exports of poor and developing countries (Koroma 2007). In a 2007 article for the United Nations, Koroma discusses the difficulties faced by “least developed countries” (LDCs) that seek to participate in globalization efforts. These countries typically lack the infrastructure to be flexible and nimble in their production and trade, and therefore are vulnerable to everything from unfavorable weather conditions to international price volatility. In short, rather than offering them more opportunities, the increased competition and fast pace of a globalized market can make it more challenging than ever for LDCs to move forward (Koroma 2007).

The increasing use of outsourcing of manufacturing and service-industry jobs to developing countries has caused increased unemployment in some developed countries. Countries that do not develop new jobs to replace those that move, and train their labor force to do them, will find support for globalization weakening.

Globalization refers to the process of integrating governments, cultures, and financial markets through international trade into a single world market. There are benefits and drawbacks to globalization. Often the countries that fare the worst are those that depend on natural resource extraction for their wealth. Many critics fear globalization gives too much power to multinational corporations and that political decisions are influenced by these major financial players.

Section Quiz

Ben lost his job when General Motors closed U.S. factories and opened factories in Mexico. Now, Ben is very anti-immigration and campaigns for large-scale deportation of Mexican nationals, even though, logically, their presence does not harm him and their absence will not restore his job. Ben might be experiencing _____________.

• global commodity chains
• global assembly line

Which of the following is not an aspect of globalization?

• Integrating governments through international trade
• Integrating cultures through international trade
• Integrating finance through international trade
• Integrating child care through international trade

One reason critics oppose globalization is that it:

• has positive impacts on world trade
• has negative impacts on the environment
• concentrates wealth in the poorest countries
• has negative impacts on political stability

All of the following are characteristics of global cities, except :

• headquarter multinational corporations
• exercise significant international political influence
• host headquarters of international NGOs
• host influential philosophers

Which of the following is not a characteristic of multinational corporations?

• A large share of their capital is collected from a variety of nationalities.
• Their business is conducted without regard to national borders.
• They concentrate wealth in the hands of core nations.
• They are headquartered primarily in the United States.

Short Answer

What impact has globalization had on the music you listen to, the books you read, or the movies or television you watch?

What effect can immigration have on the economy of a developing country?

Is globalization a danger to local cultures? Why, or why not?

Further Research

The World Social Forum (WSF) was created in response to the creation of the World Economic Forum (WEF). The WSF is a coalition of organizations dedicated to the idea of a worldwide civil society and presents itself as an alternative to WEF, which it says is too focused on capitalism. To learn more about the WSF, check out http://openstaxcollege.org/l/WSF

Abedian, Araj. 2002. “Economic Globalization: Some Pros and Cons.” Papers from the Sixth Conference of the International Environment Forum, World Summit on Sustainable Development. Johannesburg, South Africa. Retrieved January 24, 2012 ( http://iefworld.org/dabed02.htm ).

Bakan, Joel. 2004. The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power . New York: Free Press.

Bhagwati, Jagdish. 2004. In Defense of Globalization . New York: Oxford University Press.

Boswell, Terry and Dimitris Stevis. 1997. “Globalization and International Labor Organization.” Work and Occupations 24:288–308.

Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). 2014. "The World Factbook: Country Comparison: GDP Per Capita (PPP)." Retrieved December 15, 2014. (www.cia.gov/library/publicat.../2004rank.html).

Koroma, Suffyan. 2007. “Globalization, Agriculture, and the Least Developed Countries.” United Nations Ministerial Conference on the Least Developed Countries. Istanbul, Turkey.

Plahe, Jagjit. 2005. “The Global Commodity Chain Approach (GCC) Approach and the Organizational Transformation of Agriculture.” Monash University. Retrieved February 6, 2012 (www.buseco.monash.edu.au/mgt/...05/wp63-05.pdf).

Parks, James. 2011. “Report: NAFTA Has Cost 683,000 Jobs and Counting,” AFL-CIO Blog, May 3. Retrieved February 6, 2012 (blog.aflcio.org/2011/05/03/re...s-and-counting).

Sassen, Saskia. 2001. The Global City: New York, London, Tokyo . Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Speth, James G., ed. 2003. Worlds Apart: Globalization and the Environment . Washington, DC: Island Press.

The United Nations: Department of Economic and Social Affairs. 1973. “Multinational Corporations in World Development.” New York: United Nations Publication.

Wallerstein, Immanuel. 1974. The Modern World System . New York: Academic Press.

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Globalization: A Very Short Introduction (3rd edn)

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‘Globalization’ has become one of the defining buzzwords of our time — a term that describes a variety of accelerating economic, political, cultural, ideological, and environmental processes that are rapidly altering our experience of the world. Globalization: A Very Short Introduction has been fully updated for a third edition, to include recent developments in global politics, the global economy, and environmental issues. Presenting globalization in accessible language as a multifaceted process encompassing global, regional, and local aspects of social life, this VSI looks at its causes and effects, examines whether it is a new phenomenon, and explores the question of whether, ultimately, globalization is a good or a bad thing.

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The State of Globalization in 2022

• Steven A. Altman
• Caroline R. Bastian

Its collapse has been vastly overstated, according to an analysis of international flows of trade, capital, information, and people.

As companies contemplate adjustments to their global strategies, it is important to recognize how much continuity there still is even in a period of wrenching change. The idea of a world where economic efficiency alone drives patterns of international flows was always a myth. Globalization has always been an uneven process, with cross-country differences and international conflicts significantly dampening international flows. That’s a big part of why — even before the present crisis in Ukraine — only about 20% of global economic output ended up in a different country from where it was produced. As the landscape shifts, global strategies must be updated, but managers should avoid the costly overreactions that tend to follow major shocks to globalization.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has led to a new round of predictions that the end of globalization is nigh , much like we saw at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic . However, global cross-border flows have rebounded strongly since the early part of the pandemic. In our view, the war will likely reduce many types of international business activity and cause some shifts in their geography, but it will not lead to a collapse of international flows.

• Steven A. Altman is a senior research scholar, adjunct assistant professor, and director of the DHL Initiative on Globalization at the NYU Stern Center for the Future of Management .
• CB Caroline R. Bastian is a research scholar at the DHL Initiative on Globalization.

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World History Project - Origins to the Present

Course: world history project - origins to the present   >   unit 7, read: introduction to globalization.

• READ: International Institutions
• READ: Rise of China
• BEFORE YOU WATCH: Eradicating Smallpox
• WATCH: Eradicating Smallpox
• BEFORE YOU WATCH: Global China into the 21st Century
• WATCH: Global China into the 21st Century
• READ: Goods Across the World
• BEFORE YOU WATCH: Globalization I - The Upside
• WATCH: Globalization I - The Upside
• BEFORE YOU WATCH: Nonviolence and Peace Movements
• WATCH: Nonviolence and Peace Movements
• READ: Population and Environmental Trends, 1880 to the Present
• READ: Is the World Flat or Spiky?
• Global Interactions and Institutions

First read: preview and skimming for gist

Second read: key ideas and understanding content.

• What late twentieth-century trends, according to the author, led people to create the term “globalization”?
• What are some historical trends that accelerated globalization before the late twentieth century?
• What are some impacts of globalization in terms of migration and economics?
• What are some positive impacts of globalization, according to the author?
• What are some negative impacts of globalization, according to the author?

Third read: evaluating and corroborating

• What does globalization look like from your perspective? How does it affect your family and community? Do you think it has been a good thing for you? Why or why not?
• Globalization looks very differently studied through each of the three course frames. Pick one of the three course frames and describe the effects of globalization on your home town or neighborhood using only that frame narrative. How would your results have been different if you had chosen a different frame?

Introduction to Globalization

What is globalization, globalization’s effect on communities and economies, the pros and cons of globalization, want to join the conversation.

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An economist explains the pros and cons of globalization

Piling up: Global trade has increased, but has it been a positive or negative force? Image:  REUTERS/Tyrone Siu

.chakra .wef-1c7l3mo{-webkit-transition:all 0.15s ease-out;transition:all 0.15s ease-out;cursor:pointer;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;outline:none;color:inherit;}.chakra .wef-1c7l3mo:hover,.chakra .wef-1c7l3mo[data-hover]{-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;}.chakra .wef-1c7l3mo:focus,.chakra .wef-1c7l3mo[data-focus]{box-shadow:0 0 0 3px rgba(168,203,251,0.5);} Gita Gopinath

Ceri parker.

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Stay up to date:, global governance.

Every industrial revolution has driven a wave of globalization. The first wave was driven by innovations such as the steam engine and the industrial weaving machine; the second by the assembly line, the car and the plane; and the third by the digital revolution.

As we enter the fourth wave of globalization, driven by the digital revolution, there is renewed debate over whether it is a beneficial force: powering economic growth, and allowing the spread of ideas to improve people’s lives; or whether it erodes communities, and widens the gap between the elites and the rest of the world.

Globalization results in increased trade and lower prices. It heightens competition within domestic product, capital, and labour markets, as well as among countries adopting different trade and investment strategies.

But how do these impacts net out? What are the positive and negative effects of globalization? The below is an edited transcript of a conversation with Gita Gopinath, Chief Economist of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Overall, what are the advantages of globalization?

The advantages of globalization are actually much like the advantages of technological improvement. They have very similar effects: they raise output in countries, raise productivity, create more jobs, raise wages, and lower prices of products in the world economy.

What might be the advantages of globalization that someone would feel in their day-to-day life?

I think something that's not sufficiently appreciated about, for instance, international trade is that it reduces the prices of goods that they consume. So if you look at day-to-day things that you purchase, in terms of washing machines, or cars, or even clothing, because of international trade we've had a decline in prices of these goods, so they have become far more affordable for a lot of people in the world.

How have the benefits played out in advanced economies versus poorer ones over the last three decades?

Both advanced economies and developing economies have benefited overall in terms of having higher productivity, more job creation, and higher wages. As we've always known, and this is true again with technology, there are always some winners and losers. So there are communities and there are workers who lose out when there is more trade integration. That is what we're seeing right now in terms of discontent with international trade.

Who have been the biggest losers?

The biggest losers from international trade are always those whose skills have a cheaper competitor in a different market. So, in the case of the US, it's been those who work in the manufacturing sector because jobs in the manufacturing sector have been outsourced to countries where labour is far cheaper.

On the other hand, in developing countries, more capital-intensive goods get imported more cheaply from the outside. So if you're a manufacturer of a capital-intensive good in a developing country you tend to lose because of that competition.

This is how it is with international trade: production goes to wherever it is most efficient to produce. So, when people in any country are exposed to this kind of competition, some win and some lose.

Is it possible as an economist to come up with a verdict? Has this wave of globalized trade been a net positive or a net negative?

If you say, I'm going to look at it from a measure of overall effect on a country's income, on its purchasing power, on the prices that its people pay, overall I think the evidence that we have all points to it being a net positive.

Now, if you frame the question as, has international trade been good for the manufacturing worker in the US? Then the answer to that would be “not fully”; it's been very costly in terms of jobs and wages for them.

How optimistic are you that this next wave of globalization offers a better future?

I would make a couple of points. First, the previous waves of globalization have been quite successful in lifting a large number of people out of poverty and so we should appreciate that.

The second thing is that any form of globalization will generate winners and losers. So even if you have the perfect, most optimal international trade agreements, there will always be those who lose out because of competition, in the exact same way that people lose out whenever there's a new technology being developed.

And so if we want to make sure that the next wave of globalization is even more successful, it has to be complemented with good, sound domestic policies that help those who are getting left out.

How optimistic are you that the trade war between the US and China will be swiftly resolved?

It's absolutely essential that it be resolved, and it gets resolved in a way that's long lasting. The world economy has lived with the uncertainty about trade tensions for a while now and if there is any solution and there is a sense that the solution is only transitory and something can again get triggered in the future, I think that's very costly.

I'd say I'm mildly optimistic because I think leaders in the world are recognizing that these trade tensions are having a negative effect on their economies and so it would make sense to sit down and resolve it.

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Winners and Losers: Perspectives on Globalization from the Emerging Market Economies

Subscribe to the economic studies bulletin, carol graham carol graham senior fellow - economic studies @cgbrookings.

September 1, 2001

• 12 min read

In the past few years, routine meetings on the operations of the international financial institutions or on the future of free trade have filled the streets of usually peaceful cities like Seattle, Prague, and Quebec with riot police, tear gas, and protesters lashing out at globalization. The protests raise immediate and pressing logistical questions for local officials, but they also pose a more fundamental question: do the protesters represent wider popular sentiment against globalization and market policies in the world’s developing countries? Are they a sign that globalization is facing a backlash in the developing world?

The protesters claim that globalization is bad for poor people in poor countries. A large body of evidence, however, suggests the opposite—though clearly globalization can result in unsettling experiences for many who live in the developing world. My recent research with Nancy Birdsall and Stefano Pettinato suggests that globalization has brought substantial benefits and opportunities for upward mobility for many low-income individuals in the emerging economies. Yet these same opportunities entail new vulnerabilities and new risks for others.

Ironically, while the protesters focus on the plight of the poor, the groups most dissatisfied with globalization in the developing countries themselves tend to be closer to the middle of the income distribution than to the bottom. Their dissatisfaction does not portend a looming and inevitable backlash against globalization, but it does suggest that policymakers in these countries should pay attention to the insecurities of the middle class as well as those of the poor.

A genuine backlash against globalization would not take the form of demonstrations on the streets of D.C. or Seattle. Rather, it would materialize in ballot boxes in countries like Poland or Peru. In Latin America, which has led the world in implementing market reforms, many countries that once seemed modelperformers are now facing economic and political uncertainty. Argentines, for example, who were recently threatened with possible spillover effects from the economic crisis in Turkey, are facing increasing questions about the sustainability of their own currency regime, which has been central to their macroeconomic stability for more than a decade. Will voters in Latin America turn against markets and integration with the world economy?

The answer is “probably not.” In Latin America, despite widespread debate over making the market model more equitable and efficient, only one political candidate, Hugo Chavez, has so far been elected to office promising to reverse integration into global markets—and that was in Venezuela, where reform was still incomplete. But matters are far from settled. In elections last June in Peru, one of the countries that has gone furthest in implementing market reforms, Alejandro Toledo ran on a pro-market platform and barely defeated former president Alan Garcia, who gained notoriety in the late 1980s by rejecting market principles—Toledo’s margin of victory was less than 5 percent.

Who Wins and Who Loses?

Market reforms—in particular, establishing macroeconomic and fiscal stability and liberalizing trade regimes—are a prerequisite for integrating developing nations into the global economy. In Latin America, the turn to the market has delivered large—and tangible—benefits for a region plagued with high inflation, economic instability, and daunting external debt. Countries that have embraced reform have gained control of inflation, reestablished stable (if not high) growth, and liberalized and expanded the diversity of trading regimes. Most have also privatized loss—making public enterprises and insolvent social security systems.

Although market reforms are often viewed as being harsh on the poor, in reality the effect can be quite positive. Because the poor are least able to protect themselves from high inflation, for example, its elimination is particularly beneficial for them. And in many countries, market reforms have also reoriented public spending to the poor.Before reform, social spending went disproportionately to social security systems that covered limited and relatively privileged parts of the labor force, while basic social services, such as primary health and education, were severely underfunded.

Market reforms can also remove economic distortions that block the productive potential of the poor. Removing such distortions as rationed credit (because of negative real interest rates) and rigid and overprotective labor regulations that discourage hiring have helped the poor in many developing countries, as evidence from Chile, Mexico, and Peru suggests.

The same reforms that have enabled many of the poor to move well up the income distribution ladder, however, have made people somewhat higher up that ladder newly vulnerable. Many who once enjoyed middle-class status and held secure public-sector jobs have fallen into or near poverty. Relative mobility trends in reforming countries can be surprisingly volatile. Over a 10-year period many more people in Peru will move up—and down—several income quintiles than will people in the United States.

If market reforms have had different effects on people in different parts of the income distribution, what effect have they had on inequality? As our own research, building on the work of several other scholars, has shown, inequality can increase even in countries where average incomes have risen and poverty has fallen. And, indeed, aggregate measures report a mixed effect, with inequality going down in some emerging market countries and increasing slightly in others.

One trend driving the increase in inequality has been a recent upsurge in the rewards to skilled labor. Although economists had predicted that open trade would reward unskilled labor, which is in ample supply in Latin America, the greatest rewards have gone to skilled labor, which is scarce.

A related trend is top-driven inequality: vast wealth among those at the top of the income ladder relative to the rest of society, where income distribution is more equal. According to an Inter-American Development Bank study by Miguel Szekely and Marianne Hilgert, the wealthiest 10 percent of individuals in many Latin American countries earn roughly 3 times what those in the next decile earn, compared with a roughly 1.5 to 1 ratio in the United States.

One cause of top-driven inequality is the rising wage premium to educated workers. Another may be a possible increase in wealth at the top, as more open capital markets enhance opportunities for high returns. In addition, taxes on mobile capital are probably declining, while in developing countries, shallow financial sectors and underdeveloped capital markets may be limiting investment opportunities for small savers and borrowers.

The uneven benefits of globalization and market reforms no doubt explain why public opinion in the developing nations is so mixed. Those who see themselves as losers are not necessarily the poor, but rather newly vulnerable members of the middle class who perceive that gains from market reforms have gone disproportionately to the top of the income distribution.

Frustrated Achievers

Most research on subjective well-being finds that once people have reached a certain income level, their sense of well-being is determined by relative rather than absolute income. Except for the very poorest countries, these findings hold across countries, regions, and development levels. My own survey research, conducted jointly with Stefano Pettinato, generally supports these findings.

What explains these negative perceptions? In Peru, the frustrated achievers had average income, but were more urban and older than nonfrustrated upwardly mobile respondents. In Russia, they had slightly lower than average income—and also more income volatility—than their counterparts who were more content. For the most part, they were not the poorest in the sample, but rather tended toward the middle of the distribution. In Peru, while poorer respondents were much more likely to answer that their economic condition was unchanged, those in the middle were much more likely to say that it was worse.

The implications for public support for globalization are clear. In a regionwide public opinion survey of Latin America, respondents who were more satisfied with their lives were, on average, more likely to favor the market and to be satisfied with democracy. The surveys in Russia yielded similar findings. In both Russia and Peru, the frustrated achievers were less satisfied with their jobs and more critical about their economic situation vis-à-vis others in their country. These frustrations, which may influence future economic and political behavior in the emerging economies, must be addressed.

Opportunity and Insecurity

Policymakers in emerging market countries could use three strategies to reduce insecurity and enhance upward mobility—not only among the middle class, but alsoamong the poor. The first would be to make social services more widely available. Education policies, especially, could give a broader section of society access to jobs in the high-skill economic sectors. The second strategy would be to remove distortions in markets and in government policies that block the productive potential of low-income groups. Among these distortions I include excessive inequality. And the third would be to make safety nets and other forms of unemployment insurance more broadly available.

The first and most obvious way to enhance the mobility and opportunity of both the poor and the middle class is to improve access to good quality postsecondary education, including vocational education. Such a policy shift, however, will take time to bear fruit. It will also take sustained political commitment, institutional development, and substantial resources.

Fundamental to making better education more widely available is a more comprehensive social contract for delivering essential social services in general. The world’s advanced economies have vigorously debated the merits of targeted versus more universal social welfare policies (with supporters of universal policies arguing that tightly targeted policies cannot sustain the political support needed to preserve public funding). Meanwhile, many developing countries that have turned to the market have increased targeting of public social spending and reduced absolute poverty, even during times of fiscal austerity. At the same time, shifts in the rewards to different education and skill cohorts, coupled with cuts in the size and scope of public services, have led to a perception and often a reality of increased insecurity for groups in the middle of the income distribution. It is time to revisit the targeting debate. At least some targeting is usually desirable when public resources are limited. Nevertheless, it is necessary to craft a broader and more politically sustainable social contract, which includes middle-income groups as well as the poor.

Policymakers should aim to increase not only the supply of quality education, but also the demand for it. A wide body of literature, including work by economists Steven Durlauf and George Akerlof, has shown how inequality patterns can be perpetuated by persistent social norms and low expectations. In societies where the poor have no tradition of reaching higher-level education, policymakers should encourage low-income people to invest in their children’s future.

The second policy strategy is to address distortions in markets and failures in government policies. Many countries in the developing world, particularly in Latin America, have greatly improved their macroeconomic frameworks and reduced such distortions. Yet removing distortions alone is not enough. Merely replacing poorly performing public monopolies with private ones, as some countries have done, is unlikely to diminish inequality or to provide new opportunities for the poor or near poor. Adequate regulatory policies, which level the economic playing field for participants of all income levels, are essential, as are supply-side policies that facilitate the participation of the poorest citizens.

The same policy package should address inequality. Economists have shown that excessive concentration of income and assets impedes economic growth. And my recent research suggests that high inequality has additional costs in that it creates frustrations in even the most upwardly mobile individuals. These frustrations, in turn, may erode political support for market-enhancing policies that deliver sustained growth and also cut poverty.

A third essential strategy is to provide adequate safety nets. The lack of reliable safety nets can itself result in market distortions, encouraging workers to minimize risk and guarantee job security through whatever mechanisms are available, even extremely inefficient ones such as overly rigid labor laws. And the insecurity resulting from inadequate safety nets in the face of economic volatility and changing rewards to labor sectors is surely one cause of the frustrations of our achievers.

Two kinds of safety nets are necessary. One is social insurance, such as unemployment insurance, which encourages workers to try to get ahead by protecting them from the risk of income loss caused by macroeconomic volatility and other economic shocks. The second type of safety net protects the poorest who fall behind because of low skills or because poor health and other circumstances keep them from participating even in the low-skilled sector of the economy. This issue has received attention, but usually in the context of fiscal adjustments. Policymakers must develop more permanent institutions that can expand and contract as needed and provide a buffer at times of cyclical fluctuations and during downturns caused by externally driven shocks. They must also do more to manage macroeconomic volatility.

Averting Backlash

Globalization and the turn to the market have clear benefits for developing countries, both in terms of aggregate growth and poverty reduction and in terms of mobility and opportunity for low-income people. Yet new opportunities have come hand-in-hand with new vulnerabilities. Not surprisingly, public opinion about globalization and market reforms is mixed. While the street protests in the industrialized countries focus on the poor, in the developing countries people in the middle strata seem as vulnerable if not more so and also more negative in assessing their progress with the turn to the market.

That those negative perceptions exist does not mean that a backlash against globalization is inevitable. At this juncture most publics seem to be aware that self-imposed isolation from the rest of the world has high costs. Yet policymakers must address the causes of these negative perceptions—precisely so that they do not become the source of a backlash.

Reducing insecurity and distributing the benefits of reform more equitably could go a long way toward building broader and more sustainable support for continuing ,arket policies. And persuading poor people in poor countries that opportunities exist will make them much likely to invest in their children’s education—and therefore in their future in an integrated glorabl economy.

Emerging Markets & Developing Economies

Economic Studies

Joseph Asunka, Landry Signé

May 15, 2024

Margaret McMillan, Harun Onder

May 14, 2024

Anwar Aridi, Jeong-Dong Lee

May 1, 2024

Browse Course Material

Course info, instructors.

• Dr. Serenella Sferza
• Prof. Suzanne Berger

Departments

• Political Science
• Global Studies and Languages

As Taught In

• Globalization
• International Economics

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Working in a global economy, assignments, paper assignment 1, paper topics.

Papers should be seven pages long. They are due 3 days after lecture 6. Please get in touch with me if you have any questions. Whatever topic you choose, make sure you summarize the positions you are discussing, and support your arguments with reference to the relevant literature, examples and cases. No additional research is needed, but I do expect answers to show familiarity with the assigned materials.

• Some analysts believe globalization will put an end to longstanding national economic, political and cultural differences. Others disagree. Which side, if any, do you think is right, and why? While arguing your position, make sure to present the alternative viewpoint.
• The new global economy has its supporters, but also its detractors. Why is it so controversial? What are its most important benefits and pitfalls? Discuss with reference to some of the authors we have read and support your arguments with concrete examples.
• “Mondovino” portrays the transformation of the wine industry from a primarily local and artisanal production into a global one. What drives this transformation, and what are its implications? How representative is the wine industry of what’s happening in other sectors? While discussing the insights (if any) offered by the movie and the issues it raises, make sure you relate your positions to other industries, and other materials we read for the class.

Paper Assignment 2

In this paper students should analyze their experiences abroad, or any other topic/issue related to globalization in which they are interested, in light of class readings and discussions. Students can choose from a wide array of topics, but need to have their choice approved by the instructor by the end of November. Papers should include an empirical section, and a more analytical one that introduces different approaches to the issues being discussed.

Topics have ranged from regional and country-specific cases, like “Globalization and Convergence: Perspectives from the Chinese Context” and “Economy and Globalization in Zambia;” and studies of global mergers and sectors, like “DaimlerChrysler: Taken for a Ride,” and “Globalization of the Aircraft Industry;” to analyses of some of the issues and developments that are positively or negatively associated with globalization and of the institutional developments that supports it, like “Africa: The Curse of Corruption,” “Knowledge sharing through the internet & its effect on globalization,” and “Analysis of the North American Free Trade Agreement.”

To satisfy the HASS CI requirement, papers need to be at least 15 pages and students must submit a first draft of the paper for comments by the instructor before submitting their revised final version for grades. Students are also expected to present their research to the class at the end of the course.

Student Work

The following student work is used with permission and appears courtesy of the author.

Paper Topic 1

Zahir Dossa. “Globalization-Country Disclaimer: Handle with Care!” ( PDF )

Mariel John. “Globalization.” ( PDF )

Paper Topic 2

Mariel John. “Economy and Globalization in Zambia, paper.” ( PDF )

———. “Economy and Globalization in Zambia, presentation.” ( PDF )

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Economic Globalization

Economic Globalization is an economic term, as well as finance, technology and labor market issues are also focus on economic globalization. Economic globalization is the increasing economic integration in addition to interdependence of countrywide, regional and local economies around the globe through an intensification regarding cross border movement regarding goods, services, technological and capital. Whereas globalization would be a broad set processes concerning many networks of monetary, political and national interchange, contemporary economic globalization is propelled through the rapid growing significance of information to all types of effective activities and marketization, in addition to by developments in science and engineering.

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Globalisation

Table of Content

• Globalisation Effect

Globalisation in the Indian economy

What is globalisation.

The term globalisation refers to the integration of the economy of the nation with the world economy. It is a multifaceted aspect. It is a result of the collection of multiple strategies that are directed at transforming the world towards a greater interdependence and integration.

It includes the creation of networks and pursuits transforming social, economical, and geographical barriers.  Globalisation tries to build links in such a way that the events in India can be determined by the events happening distances away.

To put it in other words, globalisation is the method of interaction and union among people, corporations, and governments universally.

Also Check:  Important Questions for Liberalisation, Privatisation and Globalisation

Effect of Globalisation in India

India is one of the countries that succeeded significantly after the initiation and implementation of globalisation. The growth of foreign investment in the field of corporate, retail, and the scientific sector is enormous in the country.

It also had a tremendous impact on the social, monetary, cultural, and political areas. In recent years, globalisation has increased due to improvements in transportation and information technology. With the improved global synergies, comes the growth of global trade, doctrines, and culture.

Indian society is changing drastically after urbanisation and globalisation. The economic policies have had a direct influence in forming the basic framework of the economy.

Economic policies established and administered by the government also performed an essential role in planning levels of savings, employment, income, and investments in the society.

Cross country culture is one of the critical impacts of globalisation on Indian society. It has significantly changed several aspects of the country, including cultural, social, political, and economical.

However, economic unification is the main factor that contributes maximum to a country’s economy into an international economy.

Also Read: What are Economic Reforms?

Advantages of Globalisation in India

Increase in employment: With the opportunity of special economic zones (SEZ), there is an increase in the number of new jobs available. Including the export processing zones (EPZ) centre in India is very useful in employing thousands of people.

Another additional factor in India is cheap labour. This feature motivates the big companies in the west to outsource employees from other regions and cause more employment.

  Increase in compensation: After globalisation, the level of compensation has increased as compared to the domestic companies due to the skill and knowledge a foreign company offers. This opportunity also emerged as an alteration of the management structure.

  High standard of living: With the outbreak of globalisation, the Indian economy and the standard of living of an individual has increased. This change is notified with the purchasing behaviour of a person, especially with those who are associated with foreign companies. Hence, many cities are undergoing a better standard of living along with business development.

Impact of Globalisation

Outsourcing : This is one of the principal results of the globalisation method. In outsourcing, a company recruits regular service from the outside sources, often from other nations, that was earlier implemented internally or from within the nation (like computer service, legal advice, security, each presented by individual departments of the corporation, and advertisement).

As a kind of economic venture, outsourcing has increased, in recent times, because of the increase in quick methods of communication, especially the growth of information technology (IT).

Many of the services such as voice-based business processes (commonly known as BPS, BPO, or call centres), accountancy, record keeping, music recording, banking services, book transcription, film editing, clinical advice, or teachers are being outsourced by the companies from the advanced countries to India.

Debate on Globalisation

Solved Questions.

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Frequently Asked Questions on Globalisation

What are the different kinds of globalisation.

The top five types of globalisation are:

1. Financial globalisation. 2. Economic globalisation. 3. Technological globalisation. 4. Political globalisation. 5. Cultural globalisation.

What are examples of Globalisation?

The two examples of globalisation are as follows:

1. Travel: The capacity to travel to other places and experience their cultures. 2. Transportation:  The international transportation systems, such as air travel and shipping.

What is the importance of Globalisation?

Globalisation is important to expand the markets and enable a business to make a sensible utilisation of the available resources. It also solves various issues of an individual and the nation, giving them many options to choose from and satisfy their needs. Globalisation boosts exports, discourages import, and uplifts foreign exchange.

What are the main reasons that caused Globalisation?

The main reason that caused globalisation are as follows:

1. Making global travel easier by improving transportation. 2. Advanced technology made communication and sharing of information easier. 3. Minimised tariff barriers and encouraged global trade. 4. Broadening of global media.

What are the positive impacts of Globalisation?

The four positive impacts of globalisation are as follows:

1. Creates efficient markets 2. Increases competition 3. Stabilises security 4. Increases wealth equality across the world

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