OVERCOMING ABSOLUTE AND COMPARATIVE ADVANTAGE: A REAPPRAISAL OF THE RELATIVE CHEAPNESS OF FOREIGN COMMODITIES AS THE BASIS OF INTERNATIONAL TRADE

David Ricardo indicated in his famous numerical example in the Principles that it would be advantageous to Portugal to import English cloth made by 100 men, although it could have been produced locally with the labor of only 90 Portuguese men. As the production of the cloth required less quantity of labor in Portugal, it has been commonly inferred that this country had a production cost advantage over England in cloth making. This inference will be proven wrong here by showing that the English cloth had a lower cost of production than the Portuguese cloth. This finding refutes the widespread belief that Ricardo had formulated a new law, principle, or rule for international specialization, known as “comparative advantage.” He used the same rule for specialization as Adam Smith in the Wealth of Nations. Thus, the popular contraposition of Smith’s absolute versus Ricardo’s comparative cost advantage has to be dismissed.

OVERCOMING ABSOLUTE AND COMPARATIVE ADVANTAGE: A REAPPRAISAL OF THE RELATIVE CHEAPNESS OF FOREIGN COMMODITIES AS THE BASIS OF INTERNATIONAL TRADE

David Ricardo indicated in his famous numerical example in the Principles that it would be advantageous to Portugal to import English cloth made by 100 men, although it could have been produced locally with the labor of only 90 Portuguese men. As the production of the cloth required less quantity of labor in Portugal, it has been commonly inferred that this country had a production cost advantage over England in cloth making. This inference will be proven wrong here by showing that the English cloth had a lower cost of production than the Portuguese cloth. This finding refutes the widespread belief that Ricardo had formulated a new law, principle or rule for international specialization, known as comparative advantage. He used the same rule for specialization as Adam Smith in the Wealth of Nations. Thus, the popular contraposition of Smith’s absolute versus Ricardo’s comparative cost advantage has to be dismissed.

Has Nigerian agricultural output spurred economic growth: the financing gap model using stepwise regression

This study examined if the Nigerian agricultural output has spurred economic growth and the best fit agricultural financing gap model for growing the economy. The study explored the dynamics of different technicality approach that stepwise regression has to offer. From the seven baskets of predictors – agricultural guaranteed finance to oil palm, cocoa, groundnuts, fishery, poultry, cattle, roots and tubers – the step fitted three predictors: roots and tubers, cocoa and poultry based on “a b” parameter with the highest “t-stats” and significant p-value and subsequently executed the model using stepwise regression analysis with the help of Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 23. The dataset covers a thirty-six year period from 1981 to 2017. The source of the data is from the Central Bank of Nigeria 2018 statistical bulletin. The findings showed that individually, root and tubers has the most contributory impact on economic growth with 81 percent. Jointly followed is cocoa at 87 percent and poultry at 90 percent. The study thus recommends a comparative cost advantage to financing agriculture with the most impactful contribution to economic growth based on the model.

The Development and Evaluation of Online Smoking Cessation Services: A Narrative Literature Review

Introduction:The use of quitlines for smoking cessation has contracted, with service providers adapting through the development of comprehensive interactive online smoking cessation services. The primary aim of this review is to investigate the continuum of online cessation services, innovations in design and service components, measures used in formative, process and outcome evaluations, as well as evidence of effectiveness.Methods:This review includes the peer-reviewed literature, scholarly articles and the grey literature material. Databases searched included: PubMed, Google Scholar, SCOPUS and the Cochrane Collaboration.Results/findings:56 academic journal articles and the 5 grey literature reports met the inclusion criteria for this review. Developmental stages of online/combination services included: static websites, tailored feedback, email and text services, interactive components, social media, pharmacological offers; as well as social and professional support mechanisms. Innovations in online smoking cessation include: chat rooms, new recruitment strategies, mobile apps, service tailoring and messaging support groups. Online cessation services were significantly cheaper and more popular than quitlines; however, abstinence rates appear higher amongst quitline users.Conclusions:Three likely catalysts for the shift from quitlines to online services are the rapid development of technology, increased internet access and the general movement of the goods and services sector to digital channels. The challenge for online cessation service providers is to leverage their comparative cost advantage and develop strategies that keep pace, engage users and increase service effectiveness.Implications:Our paper synthesises a wide-range of the literature that evaluates the effectiveness and scope of online smoking cessation programs. Through applying this literature to the stages of evaluation framework, we also provide one of the first detailed roadmaps towards developing comprehensive evaluation methodology for online smoking cessation services.

World Trade Patterns: an Empirical Study of Revealed Comparative Advantage Approach

The theory of international trade emphasises that trade of an economy is determined by the factors arising from internal supply and external demand. The factors on the internal supply front constitute the elements like, cost of production, behaviour of internal demand, tariff, taxes, subsidies and overall considerations of comparative cost advantages. Factors on the external demand side include such variables as the price, quality, marketing of the products, trade and production policies of the buyer countries and the mutual trade agreements and relations between and/or among the supplier and demanding countries. Over a period of time it was found that the non-oil developing countries were facing severe constraints to augment their exports particularly in the developed market economies. These constraints were quite often mainly due to comparative cost disadvantages, lack of competitiveness, lack of commodity correspondence and so on. This leads us to examine the state of comparative advantage across products vis-a-vis products' competitiveness and commodity correspondence over time. In the context of the above, the first section examines the structure of world trade, whereas section second reveals the state of comparative cost advantage. Sections third and fourth look into the nature of the country's competitiveness and complementarities across the various products. The commodity correspondence ratio that reflects the future prospects of trade cooperation is dealt in section five, whereas, policy prescription in order to enhance trade cooperation has been discussed in section six—the concluding remarks.