Technology and Trade

Abstract

We survey research on the relationship between technology and trade. We begin with the old literature, which treated the state of technology as exogenous and asked how changes in technology affect the trade pattern and welfare. Recent research has attempted to endogenize technological progress which results either from learning- by-doing or from investments in research and development. This allows one to examine not only how technology affects trade, but also how trade affects the evolution of technology. We emphasize the parallels between the models with learning-by-doing and those with explicit R&D and highlight the role that the geographic extent of knowledge spillovers plays in mediating the relationship between trade and technological progress.