any economists here? whats the word or phrase for....

[amt27]

hi,

any economists here? whats the word or phrase for when a country imports and exports the same product,

if there is such a word or phrase,

e.g. a country imports oranges from other countries and also has an agricultural industry which growths oranges and exports some or all of the oranges

 

[Stick Legs]

Stupid?

I'm not an economist, but that seems daft to me. Of couse it happens...

 

[amt27]

yep,

I think it can be put down to trade routes (an exporter has to use another country to get goods to the final importer country).
Quality, size, etc, a country may produce a product that the consumer in that country will not buy or the producer can get more money for outside of that country, at the same time the country imports the same product which is more desired by the consumer of that country.
Also a trade agreement might mean a importer has agreed to accept a certain quantity of product which may oversupply the demand, so this is exported.
Then there is just normal trading for profit, one country imports to export to another country whilst adding value.

there may not be a word or phrase for it a lot, been googling too long on the topic,

 

[tintin40]

We import coal and we are sitting on hundreds of years of it.

 

[Lysander]

Monetary Vindaloo??




Straight in, Straight Through..............

 

[Elev12k]

Hi,

In Holland we call it 'dozen schuiven' ...moving boxes in English For example containers with cheap toys from China arrive in Rotterdam and they sell them WITH A PROFIT to our eastern neigbours.

And that is not stupid.

 

[Russell]

I think that most economists see the Law of Comparative Advantage as the ideal way for countries to trade with each other. This is when countries specialise in the production of certain goods, and trade with their neighbours for other goods that they don't produce.

What you're suggesting seems to defy the 'law' so would probably just be classed as inefficient by a real economist.

There are reasons why it could/should happen though, for example if Country 'a' refuses to trade with country 'c', country 'b' may be used as an intermediary, buying cheap oranges from 'a' and selling to 'c' at a profit, whilst selling their own oranges domestically.

 

[DM]

Intra-industry trade:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intra-industry_trade

You might see this erroneously described as "Countertrade" by one web source. But Countertrade is something different.

I think that most economists see the Law of Comparative Advantage as the ideal way for countries to trade with each other....

What you're suggesting seems to defy the 'law' so would probably just be classed as inefficient by a real economist.

This suggests that countries trade to their own comparative advantage
(e.g. Got a lot of capital but little labour? Then use your abundant capital to buy labour-intensive goods from countries with lots of labour but little capital).

The above is described by the Hecksher-Ohlin model.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_trade

But the H-O model ignores two-way trade and other anomalies.
http://nobelprize.org/educational_games/economics/trade/ohlin.html

"Real" economic theory assumes "perfect Markets".
Unfortunately, that is never the case. There are always market distortions or perverse incentives that act to distort those perfect trade conditions .

Typically, comparative advantages include factors such as domestic tax differences; international trade tariffs or barriers; labour cost inequalities; or non-costed market externalities like environmental damage that make it appear CHEAP (using economic theory) to convert natural resources into consumer export tat and ship cheap Chinese crap around the world using ever-scarcer and ever more damaging fossil fuels.
[/gets off high horse].

See the Leontief Paradox
http://hel.org.uk/business/gsm2comparative.htm

http://www.mapeters.fsnet.co.uk/Essays/ec504.htm

Also see "Reciprocal dumping" where bi-lateral trade is distorted by countries intentionally lowering their costs to dump goods in competing markets, thereby assisting their own export market and undercutting the target country's domestic market. Reciprocal dumping is when this occurs bi-laterally....

blah, blah, blah...

What a load of bolx.
Economics is mostly bunk and cannot be tested or falsified like the genuine sciences.
It's all just competing theories and conjecture.

None of it works perfectly in the real world and economists are no better at predicting economic outcomes than monkeys with a dartboard.

 

[amt27]

thanks DM thats great