WTO Membership and Corruption
نویسندگان
چکیده
Despite widespread belief that membership in the World Trade Organization (WTO) improves the quality of governance, there is no convincing empirical evidence. Here, we investigate whether WTO membership has a causal effect on firm-level reports of political corruption using a nonparametric partial identification approach to bound the average treatment effect (ATE). We also analyze conditional ATEs to explore various sources of potential heterogeneity. Contrary to existing thought, we find that WTO membership is likely to increase corruption, particularly among government-owned firms and economies with stringent market entry regulation and low outflows of foreign direct investment. JEL: C21, D73, F13
منابع مشابه
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