Oleksandr Shepotylo

Export diversification across countries and products: Do Eastern European (EE) and Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries diversify enough?

Tue, 01 Jan 2013 00:00:00 GMT

Eastern European and CIS countries both substantially increased trade openness since the start of transition, but took different paths in the product and geographic composition of their exports. Comparing actual diversification to levels predicted by a gravity equation estimated on a large country sample for 2001–2007, I find CIS countries deviate substantially from predicted diversification levels, while EE countries track the model much more closely. All CIS countries lag the region’s leaders, the Czech Republic and Poland, in export diversification; countries heavily engaged in raw-materials exports have the most concentrated exports, and Belarus has the least geographically diversified exports of any transition country.

Published in: The Journal of International Trade & Economic Development, 2013.

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Spatial spillovers in the development of institutions

Tue, 01 Jan 2013 00:00:00 GMT

Institutional quality in one country is not independent of institutional quality next door: reform and dysfunction both spread across borders. We develop a spatial econometric framework to estimate these cross-country spillovers directly, rather than treating each country’s institutions as determined purely by its own history and policy choices.

Published in: Journal of Development Economics, 101(C), 297–315

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Impact of WTO Accession on the Bound and Applied Tariff Rates of Russia

Tue, 01 Jan 2013 00:00:00 GMT

Using ten-digit trade data, we assess how Russia’s tariff structure changed as a result of joining a customs union with Kazakhstan and Belarus, and how it will change as WTO commitments phase in through 2020. WTO commitments progressively and significantly lower Russia’s applied tariffs, ultimately falling to 45–68% of pre-accession levels, with the largest fall on a trade-weighted basis: from 13.0% to 5.8% weighted average, versus 11.5% to 7.9% unweighted. Even after full implementation, bound tariffs will still exceed applied tariffs on nearly 1,500 tariff lines.

Published in: Eastern European Economics, 2013. With David G. Tarr.

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Cities in Transition

Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT

Post-socialist cities inherited industrial geographies built for central planning, not markets. This paper tracks how urban economic structure in transition countries evolved after 1991 — which cities adapted, which stayed locked into declining industries, and what that implies for regional policy.

Published in: Comparative Economic Studies, 54(3), 661–688

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Spatial complementarity of FDI: the example of transition countries

Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT

Foreign direct investment into one transition country raises, rather than diverts, FDI into its neighbours — the opposite of the substitution effect that simple location-competition models predict. We show FDI flows into this region are spatial complements, most plausibly through shared supply chains and demonstration effects on investor perceptions of the wider region.

Published in: Post-Communist Economies, 24(3), 327–349

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Three-Point-For-Win in Soccer: Are There Incentives for Match Fixing?

Fri, 01 Jan 2010 00:00:00 GMT

A companion piece to my work on the three-point-for-a-win rule: I test whether the rule creates incentives for collusion among teams of similar strength, particularly in lower-quality leagues with weaker media scrutiny and governance. Evidence from the Ukrainian league is consistent with a specific cooperation scheme — winning at home and conceding away — that inflates the total points collected by colluding pairs of teams relative to what genuine competition would produce.

Working paper: SSRN Working Paper, 2010.

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The Law of Unintended Consequences in Soccer: Impact of Three-Point-A-Win Rule on Strategies and Outcomes

Fri, 01 Jan 2010 00:00:00 GMT

A side project in applied econometrics: using a large sample of European league matches from 1990–1997, I test whether switching from two to three points for a win — intended to reward attacking play — actually changed team strategies and match outcomes. The rule change altered incentives in ways that are not obviously captured by simple before/after comparisons of goals scored, illustrating how well-intentioned rule changes can produce unanticipated strategic responses.

Working paper: SSRN Working Paper, 2010.

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Specific Tariffs, Tariff Simplification, and the Structure of Import Tariffs in Russia

Tue, 01 Jan 2008 00:00:00 GMT

Russia’s tariff structure contains over 11,000 tariff lines, of which roughly 1,700 can carry a specific (per-unit) tariff — these are typically excluded from published ad valorem tariff statistics, understating true protection. Using a new dataset, we provide the first accurate assessment of Russian tariff rates: the average tariff rose from about 11.5% in 2001 to 13–14.5% by 2003, then held steady through 2005, placing Russia above other middle-income countries and well above the OECD. The trade-weighted standard deviation of tariffs roughly doubled from 9.5% to 18% over 2001–2003 before falling back to 15.2% by 2005; ignoring specific tariffs underestimates average tariff rates by one to three percentage points.

Published in: Eastern European Economics, 2008. With David Tarr.

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