Trade Diversion (Jonathan Dingel)
@tradediversion.bsky.social
Economist at Columbia University. Trade Diversion is a blog about trade & globalization.
www.tradediversion.net
www.tradediversion.net
Trade JMCs: Each year, I compile a list of international-trade job-market papers. To make sure you're on my list (& save me some work), please reply with your info in the following format:
Firstname Surname (School) - JMP title - homepageURL
[Spatial JMCs: reply to other post]
Firstname Surname (School) - JMP title - homepageURL
[Spatial JMCs: reply to other post]
November 5, 2025 at 1:03 PM
Trade JMCs: Each year, I compile a list of international-trade job-market papers. To make sure you're on my list (& save me some work), please reply with your info in the following format:
Firstname Surname (School) - JMP title - homepageURL
[Spatial JMCs: reply to other post]
Firstname Surname (School) - JMP title - homepageURL
[Spatial JMCs: reply to other post]
Spatial JMCs: Each year, I compile a list of spatial-economics job-market papers. To make sure you're on my list (& save me some work), please reply with your info in the following format:
Firstname Surname (School) - JMP title - homepageURL
[Trade JMCs: reply to other tweet]
Firstname Surname (School) - JMP title - homepageURL
[Trade JMCs: reply to other tweet]
November 5, 2025 at 1:03 PM
Spatial JMCs: Each year, I compile a list of spatial-economics job-market papers. To make sure you're on my list (& save me some work), please reply with your info in the following format:
Firstname Surname (School) - JMP title - homepageURL
[Trade JMCs: reply to other tweet]
Firstname Surname (School) - JMP title - homepageURL
[Trade JMCs: reply to other tweet]
I enjoy this week's class in my PhD course because it's important and I'm still figuring things out.
github.com/jdingel/econ...
github.com/jdingel/econ...
November 5, 2025 at 1:00 PM
I enjoy this week's class in my PhD course because it's important and I'm still figuring things out.
github.com/jdingel/econ...
github.com/jdingel/econ...
I'm teaching graduate trade again this fall. Just posted the latest syllabus: github.com/jdingel/econ...
Inside the sausage factory:
Inside the sausage factory:
August 15, 2025 at 6:55 PM
I'm teaching graduate trade again this fall. Just posted the latest syllabus: github.com/jdingel/econ...
Inside the sausage factory:
Inside the sausage factory:
I wish the authors of the @99pi.org episode on food deserts and antitrust had talked to some economists about the consumer welfare standard in general and food deserts in particular.
July 10, 2025 at 1:18 PM
I wish the authors of the @99pi.org episode on food deserts and antitrust had talked to some economists about the consumer welfare standard in general and food deserts in particular.
Rappaport and Humann built metropolitan areas as collections of tracts rather than counties: authors.elsevier.com/a/1lMmILPdB3...
Looks much more sensible. Also, have people carefully compared CBSAs and commuting zones before? Yikes.
Looks much more sensible. Also, have people carefully compared CBSAs and commuting zones before? Yikes.
July 10, 2025 at 12:46 AM
Rappaport and Humann built metropolitan areas as collections of tracts rather than counties: authors.elsevier.com/a/1lMmILPdB3...
Looks much more sensible. Also, have people carefully compared CBSAs and commuting zones before? Yikes.
Looks much more sensible. Also, have people carefully compared CBSAs and commuting zones before? Yikes.
On using a truncated singular value decomposition as a low-rank approximation of a matrix, this slide from @cconlon.bsky.social is likely more compelling than our paper's paragraphs: chrisconlon.github.io/site/semipar...
June 25, 2025 at 4:02 PM
On using a truncated singular value decomposition as a low-rank approximation of a matrix, this slide from @cconlon.bsky.social is likely more compelling than our paper's paragraphs: chrisconlon.github.io/site/semipar...
📣 Fresh "Spatial Economics for Granular Settings" at jdingel.com w/ new results:
- Analytical results about overfitting and idiosyncrasies in special cases
- SVD approximation is better than we realized
- Code for main-text exhibits at github.com/jdingel/Ding...
- Analytical results about overfitting and idiosyncrasies in special cases
- SVD approximation is better than we realized
- Code for main-text exhibits at github.com/jdingel/Ding...
June 25, 2025 at 2:29 PM
📣 Fresh "Spatial Economics for Granular Settings" at jdingel.com w/ new results:
- Analytical results about overfitting and idiosyncrasies in special cases
- SVD approximation is better than we realized
- Code for main-text exhibits at github.com/jdingel/Ding...
- Analytical results about overfitting and idiosyncrasies in special cases
- SVD approximation is better than we realized
- Code for main-text exhibits at github.com/jdingel/Ding...
It is the year 2025 and many economists do not know what Git is. Let's revisit a decade-old classic:
web.stanford.edu/~gentzkow/re...
web.stanford.edu/~gentzkow/re...
June 6, 2025 at 11:55 AM
It is the year 2025 and many economists do not know what Git is. Let's revisit a decade-old classic:
web.stanford.edu/~gentzkow/re...
web.stanford.edu/~gentzkow/re...
The Cowles conference on industrial organization has a cooler title than the other fields.
cowles.yale.edu/events/confe...
cowles.yale.edu/events/confe...
June 4, 2025 at 6:05 PM
The Cowles conference on industrial organization has a cooler title than the other fields.
cowles.yale.edu/events/confe...
cowles.yale.edu/events/confe...
Gene Grossman on methods: "In my generation, we used to call that the error term, but now it’s part of the model. Then when you do counterfactuals you don’t know what the hell they are, but you have to hold them constant."
economics.princeton.edu/news/alumni-...
economics.princeton.edu/news/alumni-...
May 28, 2025 at 5:20 PM
Gene Grossman on methods: "In my generation, we used to call that the error term, but now it’s part of the model. Then when you do counterfactuals you don’t know what the hell they are, but you have to hold them constant."
economics.princeton.edu/news/alumni-...
economics.princeton.edu/news/alumni-...
Google Scholar has 4 hits for "quantitative trade model" and "untargeted moment". Ishan Nath (JPE 2025) is the only published of the four.
QTM + "overidentification" yields 23 hits. Top result says overID is good idea.
Are people using other phrases that I should search?
QTM + "overidentification" yields 23 hits. Top result says overID is good idea.
Are people using other phrases that I should search?
May 15, 2025 at 11:59 PM
Google Scholar has 4 hits for "quantitative trade model" and "untargeted moment". Ishan Nath (JPE 2025) is the only published of the four.
QTM + "overidentification" yields 23 hits. Top result says overID is good idea.
Are people using other phrases that I should search?
QTM + "overidentification" yields 23 hits. Top result says overID is good idea.
Are people using other phrases that I should search?
I should have posted this before April 15, oops: do not overestimate the department fixed effect's contribution to individual outcomes. Look at these overlapping distributions.
pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdfplus/...
Has anyone updated this to cover post-2000 cohorts?
pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdfplus/...
Has anyone updated this to cover post-2000 cohorts?
April 26, 2025 at 11:19 PM
I should have posted this before April 15, oops: do not overestimate the department fixed effect's contribution to individual outcomes. Look at these overlapping distributions.
pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdfplus/...
Has anyone updated this to cover post-2000 cohorts?
pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdfplus/...
Has anyone updated this to cover post-2000 cohorts?
TIL: While tariff rates are defined for 8-digit HTS codes, tariff exemptions are defined at some level more disaggregate than the finest 10-digit code.
direct.mit.edu/asep/article...
"because U.S. import data are collected at the HS10 level, it is not possible to track..."
direct.mit.edu/asep/article...
"because U.S. import data are collected at the HS10 level, it is not possible to track..."
April 16, 2025 at 10:51 PM
TIL: While tariff rates are defined for 8-digit HTS codes, tariff exemptions are defined at some level more disaggregate than the finest 10-digit code.
direct.mit.edu/asep/article...
"because U.S. import data are collected at the HS10 level, it is not possible to track..."
direct.mit.edu/asep/article...
"because U.S. import data are collected at the HS10 level, it is not possible to track..."
I like to think that I prepared my students well for this week. Here's a final-exam question from a few years ago.
April 5, 2025 at 6:17 PM
I like to think that I prepared my students well for this week. Here's a final-exam question from a few years ago.
USTR: "The elasticity of import prices with respect to tariffs, φ, is 0.25. The recent experience with U.S. tariffs on China has demonstrated that tariff passthrough to retail prices was low (Cavallo et al, 2021)."
Cavallo et al: φ is 0.945.
www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=...
Cavallo et al: φ is 0.945.
www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=...
April 3, 2025 at 2:07 AM
USTR: "The elasticity of import prices with respect to tariffs, φ, is 0.25. The recent experience with U.S. tariffs on China has demonstrated that tariff passthrough to retail prices was low (Cavallo et al, 2021)."
Cavallo et al: φ is 0.945.
www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=...
Cavallo et al: φ is 0.945.
www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=...
I stand corrected. The formula is not deficit/imports. The formula is surplus/(imports * ε * φ), where ε = -4 and φ = 0.25. That happens to equal deficits/imports.
ustr.gov/issue-areas/...
via @ericadyork.bsky.social
ustr.gov/issue-areas/...
via @ericadyork.bsky.social
April 3, 2025 at 1:48 AM
I stand corrected. The formula is not deficit/imports. The formula is surplus/(imports * ε * φ), where ε = -4 and φ = 0.25. That happens to equal deficits/imports.
ustr.gov/issue-areas/...
via @ericadyork.bsky.social
ustr.gov/issue-areas/...
via @ericadyork.bsky.social
The Trump tariff formula is the bilateral trade deficit divided by the US imports from the foreign country.
www.perplexity.ai/search/for-e...
Via x.com/orthonormali...
www.perplexity.ai/search/for-e...
Via x.com/orthonormali...
April 2, 2025 at 10:40 PM
The Trump tariff formula is the bilateral trade deficit divided by the US imports from the foreign country.
www.perplexity.ai/search/for-e...
Via x.com/orthonormali...
www.perplexity.ai/search/for-e...
Via x.com/orthonormali...
Detail I missed in BJH: "Isolating the within-period variation in manufacturing shocks requires further controls in the incomplete shares case, as discussed in Section 4.3. Specifically, column 3 controls for lagged manufacturing shares interacted with period indicators..."
doi.org/10.1093/rest...
doi.org/10.1093/rest...
March 15, 2025 at 12:38 AM
Detail I missed in BJH: "Isolating the within-period variation in manufacturing shocks requires further controls in the incomplete shares case, as discussed in Section 4.3. Specifically, column 3 controls for lagged manufacturing shares interacted with period indicators..."
doi.org/10.1093/rest...
doi.org/10.1093/rest...
I am tentatively happy with how this lecture on "Identification, calibration, and exact hat algebra" turned out.
github.com/jdingel/econ...
github.com/jdingel/econ...
March 12, 2025 at 8:15 PM
I am tentatively happy with how this lecture on "Identification, calibration, and exact hat algebra" turned out.
github.com/jdingel/econ...
github.com/jdingel/econ...
Takashi Onoda: "Production Costs, Not Transport Cost Savings, Drive Trade Patterns: Revisiting Theories of Market Size"
www.tksonoda.com
www.tksonoda.com
February 16, 2025 at 5:57 PM
Takashi Onoda: "Production Costs, Not Transport Cost Savings, Drive Trade Patterns: Revisiting Theories of Market Size"
www.tksonoda.com
www.tksonoda.com
Via @foxecon.bsky.social: "The forgotten discovery of gravity models and the inefficiency of early railway networks" by Andrew Odlyzko
January 14, 2025 at 3:05 AM
Via @foxecon.bsky.social: "The forgotten discovery of gravity models and the inefficiency of early railway networks" by Andrew Odlyzko
I have a soft spot for the history of economic thought. I'd love to see a history of the gravity equation in urban economics. I recently stumbled across Alex Anas - "Discrete choice theory, information theory and the multinomial logit and gravity models" (1983). doi.org/10.1016/0191...
January 13, 2025 at 6:53 PM
I have a soft spot for the history of economic thought. I'd love to see a history of the gravity equation in urban economics. I recently stumbled across Alex Anas - "Discrete choice theory, information theory and the multinomial logit and gravity models" (1983). doi.org/10.1016/0191...
