Trade restriction indices and US trade policy

Abstract

The proper way to measure differences in trade protection across countries and economic sectors has been a vexing problem for economists studying international trade. Based on research by Anderson and Neary (2005) and Kee et al. (KNO) (2009), this article proposes the use of Trade Restriction Indices (TRIs) when studying US trade policy. TRIs can potentially solve several problems related to measuring the restrictiveness of trade policy. To this end, this article creates a data set of TRIs for US imports by sector at several different levels of aggregation using the Harmonized Tariff Schedule (HS), the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) and the Standard International Trade Classification industry coding systems.

Keywords:

• trade restriction indices
• US trade policy
• trade protection
• nontariff barriers

JEL Classification:

• F13
• F14

Notes

¹These authors have written a number of articles on this topic. A summary of their work can be found in Anderson and Neary (2005).

² The thousands of sectors for which we have calculated data cannot be presented in a compact format here, but are available from the author on request.

³ For our purposes, an agricultural import is an import classified with a 2-digit HS code of 24 or less.