Publications
Journal
"Attitudes Towards Globalization Barriers and Implications for Voting: Evidence from Sweden", (with Leyla D. Karakas and Devashish Mitra), Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, vol. 190, 851-877, (2021)
Abstract : Using six waves of the Swedish National Election Studies (SNES) survey data, we investigate the determinants of attitudes towards globalization barriers (trade and immigration) and how important these attitudes are in how people vote. In line with the existing results in the literature, we find that more educated and richer voters support freer trade and more immigration. We also find that conservative voters in Sweden are more likely to prefer freer trade but higher immigration barriers. Once various economic and demographic determinants of globalization barrier preferences along with voters’ ideologies on a liberal-conservative spectrum are controlled for in the analysis of voting behavior, trade barrier preferences lose their statistical significance while attitudes towards immigration barriers remain significant. This suggests that immigration attitudes affect voting behavior through channels involving identity-driven factors that are different from the channels through which more traditional electoral issues, such as trade barriers, work. Focusing on the anti-globalization Swedish Democrats, we confirm that voters with a greater preference for barriers to immigration were more likely to switch their votes to this party from the 2014 to the 2018 election.
Presentations : Jönköping University (Brown Bag Seminar), Syracuse University (Graduate Student Workshop)
Book Chapter
"The Relationship between Economic Growth and Democracy: Alternative Representations of Technological Change", (with Almas Heshmati), Panel Data Econometrics, 885-929, (2019)
Abstract : This study investigates the relationship between economic growth and democracy by estimating a nation’s production function specified as static and dynamic models using panel data. The production function applies a single time trend, multiple time trends, and general index formulations to the translog production function to capture time effects representing technological changes of unknown forms. In addition, implementing the technology shifters model enabled this study to find possible known channels between economic growth and democracy. Empirical results based on a panel data of 144 countries observed for 1980–2014 show that democracy had a robust positive impact on economic growth. Credit guarantee is one of the most significant positive links between economic growth and democracy. In order to check the robustness of these results, a dynamic model constructed with a flexible adjustment speed and a target level of GDP also is tested.
Presentation : IPDC 2018
Working Paper
Abstract : Re-allocation of labor from less productive sectors to more productive sectors is essential for economic growth. Since only some developing countries achieve productive labor re-allocation, it is important to address its determinants. This paper focuses on the role of unionization in structural change in South Korea and Taiwan whose unionization proceeded rapidly after democratization. I provide detailed dynamics by constructing an index for the degree of unionization for each sector in each region of these two East Asian democracies. The magnitude of growth-enhancing structural change was lower when a sector in a region had a higher degree of unionization. In other words, if a sector had higher labor unionization, the size of the increase in its employment share from the productivity premium was lower. These findings suggest that the institutional properties represented by unionization can affect the dynamics and growth implications of structural change.
Presentations (*=Scheduled) : Asia Development Bank (ADB), Cornell conference on 100 Years of Economic Development, Jönköping University, ISEAPA African Productivity Conference, Syracuse University, Korea Institute for International Economic Policy, Corvinus University of Budapest, Korea Development Institute, Korea Labor Institute, Korea Institute of Local Finance
"Import Penetration, Export Growth, and Election Outcome: Evidence from 2022 Election in South Korea", (with Sungbae An and Kyong Hyun Koo)
Submitted
Abstract : This paper studies how trade expansions are related to election outcomes in South Korea. We quantify the degree of export growth as well as import expansion for 240 regions in South Korea by incorporating region-industry-specific labor distributions based on the firm-level census. We implement two-stage least squares estimation to handle the possible simultaneities caused by trade penetration variables adequately. This paper identifies that a region with higher import penetration from China had relatively more support for the conservative presidential candidate in the 2022 presidential election compared to the 2002 presidential election. On the other hand, a region with higher export penetration towards China had relatively smaller support for the conservative presidential candidate in 2022. Adding South Korea’s bilateral trade with Vietnam, another major trading partner of South Korea, provides the same insights. These findings confirm that the heterogeneous local labor market impacts coming from import and export can provide different political preferences of voters and, consequently, different political outcomes.
"Protectionism of Voters in the Philippines and Thailand: Comparative Approach to the Political Economy of Protection"
Submitted
Abstract : This paper studies what determines voters' attitudes towards protectionist trade policy by focusing on the Philippines and Thailand. Using cross-country survey data collected in 2020, I estimate determinants of trade barrier preference in these two Southeast Asian nations. Econometric specifications are based on the Heckscher-Ohlin type factor endowment approach and specific-factor models. Empirical results support that the theoretical predictions made by the factor endowment approach are successful in explaining individual-level protectionism in the two countries: individuals with higher educational attainment prefer higher trade barriers. However, sector-specific interest predicted by the specific-factor model does not empirically explain the voters' attitudes toward protectionism. This means that, in the Philippines and Thailand, long-run determinants suggested by the factor endowment approach are robust channels, while short-run determinants elaborated by the specific-factor model are not. By applying the identical method to seven Asia-Pacific nations, I find that the positive relationship between educational attainment and the preferred level of protection is unique in the Philippines and Thailand among Asia-Pacific nations with available data.
Executive Summary : This paper explores the connection between individuals’ barrier preference toward immigration and refugee policy and how they are linked to voting behavior. We use three different datasets to tackle these two questions. We utilize multi-country survey data with abundant information regarding voters’ subjective attitudes toward immigrants to study the determinants of far-right voting in Europe. Notably, even after controlling for education, income level, or current employment status, which represents the human capital endowment of natives, industry-level comparative advantage and disadvantage, and political scale from left to right, we still find that a preference for immigration barriers has strong explanatory power for far-right voting behavior. We find that educational attainment and income level are important in explaining voters’ anti-immigration attitudes, as the Heckscher-Ohlin model predicts. On average, voters with higher education and higher income are relatively more open to immigration and aware of their role in the economy.
In addition to the cross-country election studies that allow us to study the anti-immigration attitude, we also use election surveys conducted in the Netherlands and France to add more details on the role of individual immigration and refugee policy preference in the voting behavior. The election survey on the parliamentary election of the Netherlands provides a special identification approach that is not available in cross-country election surveys. The panel structure of the Dutch survey allows us to observe the voting history of respondents in 2012, 2017, 2019, and 2021 parliamentary elections. Using this information, this paper clarifies the characteristics of voters who newly join supporting right-wing populism. In other words, we study determinants of ‘switching’ voting behavior from non-populist parties to right-wing populist parties focusing on the refugee barrier preference. We explore whether attitudes towards refugees affect this switching behavior in the politics of the Netherlands. The election survey on French voters covers the most recent presidential election in France. We elaborate on how immigration policy preferences of French voters are related with the popularity of right-wing populist presidential candidates in France.
Considering that non-economic factors contribute to explaining the far-right voting behavior, utilizing other non-economic variables such as individuals’ sentiments towards various entities (including the government, legal system, and the European Parliament), and subjective evaluation of their own health and happiness can also add explanatory power, as numerous previous findings imply. For systematic consideration of these abundant variables in the ESS data, we use LASSO for variable selection. For this exercise, we consider two approaches in selecting the optimal penalty term, namely cross-validation (CV) and Bayesian information criterion (BIC). It is worth highlighting that almost all of the immigration barrier preference variables are selected when using both CV and BIC for variable selection criteria.
Work In Progress
"Nonlinear Dynamic Gravity Model of Bilateral Trade with Flexible Adjustment Speed", (with Almas Heshmati) (Slides (IPDC Amsterdam 2023))
Abstract : We suggest an alternative specification of gravity model with adjustment speed of bilateral trade flows and expected free-trade-level of bilateral trade flows. Even though recent developments in gravity model started implementing dynamic nature, their dynamic settings are not enough to show us channel of shocks, adjustment, and determinants of adjustment. By implementing nonlinear estimation method, we are able to test dynamic specification which incorporates adjustment speed of trade flows. Aggregated estimation throughout every industry is suggested in this paper. Our results show that, during the recent decades, the importance of trade policy has increased considerably in explaining the adjustment speed of bilateral trade flow.