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Analyzing the experience of Mexico under the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), Lessons from NAFTA aims to provide guidance to Latin American and Caribbean countries considering free trade agreements with the United States. The authors conclude that the treaty raised external trade and foreign investment inflows and had a modest effect on Mexico’s average income per person. It is likely that the treaty also helped achieve a modest reduction in poverty and an improvement in job quality. This book will be of interest to scholars and policymakers interested in international trade and development. \"The best quantitative evaluation of NAFTA¯where it paid off, where it didn’t, and where we don't know. Indispensable for every Latin American and Caribbean country considering a free trade pact with the United States.\" —Gary Clyde Hufbauer, Reginald Jones Senior Fellow Institute for International Economics \"Lessons from NAFTA is a well-articulated and insightful book that covers many of the relevant areas related to the Agreement. In a hemisphere plenty of trade negotiations among Latin American countries and United States, this report written by leading trade and development researchers will be a crucial reference to analyze the impact of these agreements. As the authors mention, to grasp the new opportunities requires countries to be aware that 'improving macroeconomic performance and institutions and putting in place an education and innovation system' are areas that cannot be solved through FTAs. The onus remains on domestic policy.\" —Jose Luis Machinea, Executive Secretary of the United Nations' Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, former Finance Minister of Argentina.

Contact author: Andrea Pittman, Arizona State University, P.O. Box 870102, Tempe, AZ 85287-0102. E-mail: andrea.pittman{at}asu.edu . Purpose: The purpose of the present study was to examine the effect of minimal hearing loss (HL) on children's ability to perform simultaneous tasks in quiet and in noise. Method: Ten children with minimal HL and 11 children with normal hearing (NH) participated. Both groups ranged in age from 8 to 12 years. The children categorized common words (primary task) while completing dot-to-dot games (secondary task) in quiet as well as in noise presented at 0 dB and +6 dB signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs). It was hypothesized that the children's progression through the dot-to-dot games would slow as they encountered more difficult listening environments. This hypothesis was based on the theory that listeners have limited cognitive resources to allocate to any combination of tasks. Results: The dot rate of both groups decreased similarly in the multitasking conditions relative to baseline. However, no other differences between groups or listening conditions were revealed. Significantly poorer word categorization was observed for the children with minimal HL in noise. Conclusion: These data suggest that children with minimal HL may be unable to respond to a difficult listening task by drawing resources from other tasks to compensate. KEY WORDS: children, hearing loss, listening effort, noise, multitasking CiteULike     Connotea     Del.icio.us     Digg     Facebook     Reddit     Technorati     Twitter     What's this?

The report provides a preliminary assessment of DR-CAFTA, with particular attention to three key themes: (i) expected trade and non-trade benefits, (ii) actions that Central American countries need to pursue to capitalize optimally on the new opportunities, and (iii) identification of the population groups that may require assistance to adapt to a more competitive environment. The Introductory Chapter reviews the main findings of the report. Chapter II places DR-CAFTA in the historical context of the economic reforms that Central America has been undertaking since the late 1980s. Chapter III provides a summary overview of the recently negotiated DR-CAFTA. Chapter IV reviews various analyses that assess the potential impacts of DR-CAFTA in Central American countries. Chapter V focuses on the identification of potentially affected populations from the easing of trade restrictions in sensitive agricultural products and analyzes policy options to assist vulnerable groups. Chapter VI reviews evidence related to key macroeconomic implications of DR-CAFTA, namely the potential revenue losses and effect on the patterns of business-cycle synchronization. Chapter VII reviews evidence from each Central American country in the areas of trade facilitation, institutional and regulatory reforms, and innovation and education, in order to identify key priorities for the complementary agenda for DR-CAFTA.

This paper studies tariff-tax reforms in a calibrated two-region global New Keynesian model composed of a developing and an advanced region. In our baseline calibration, a revenue-neutral reform that lowers tariffs in developing countries can reduce domestic welfare. The reason is that the increase in developing countries welfare due to higher output is dominated by the welfare losses stemming from the deterioration of the terms of trade. On the other hand, the reform increases output and welfare in the advanced countries and in the world as a whole. The effects that we highlight have not been studied in previous contributions to the literature, which typically looks at tariff-tax reforms using a small open economy framework. Nominal rigidities have important implications for adjustment dynamics in our model. In the case of a \"point-for-point\" reform, for example, price stickiness implies that the international dynamics of output is reversed compared to a revenue neutral reform.

Regional Economic Outlook: Sub-Saharan Africa Prepared by the Policy Wing of the IMF African Department, this first, annual issue of Regional Economic Outlook: Sub-Saharan Africa analyzes economic, trade, and institutional issues in 2004, and prospects in 2005, for the 42 countries covered by the Department (for data reasons, Eritrea and Liberia are excluded). Topics examined include responses to exogenous shocks, growth performance and growth-enhancing policies, and the effectiveness of regional trade arrangements. Detailed aggregate and country data (as of February 24, 2005) are provided in an appendix and a statistical appendix, and a list of relevant publications by the African Department is included.