Causing Problems? The WTO Review of Causation and Injury Attribution in U.S. Section 201 Cases

Irwin, Douglas A.

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Causing Problems? The WTO Review of Causation and Injury Attribution in U.S. Section 201 Cases

NBER Working Paper No. w9815

42 Pages Posted: 5 Jul 2003 Last revised: 29 Oct 2022

See all articles by Douglas A. Irwin

Douglas A. Irwin

Dartmouth College - Department of Economics; National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)

Date Written: July 2003

Abstract

U.S. safeguard actions have run into problems with the WTO's Panel and Appellate Body reviews for failing to ensure that injury caused by non-import factors is not attributed to imports. This paper reviews the subtle legal and economic differences between U.S. trade law (Section 201) and the WTO's Agreement on Safeguards on the non-attribution issue. The paper then resurrects the Kelly (1988) method of attributing injury to various factors as a potential method by which the ITC can ensure that future decisions conform with the Safeguards Agreement. The method is shown to yield results that are consistent with recent ITC safeguard decisions.

Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation

Irwin, Douglas A., Causing Problems? The WTO Review of Causation and Injury Attribution in U.S. Section 201 Cases (July 2003). NBER Working Paper No. w9815, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=421776