Essays in International Economics and Political Economy of Trade Policy

My primary areas of research interest are international economics, political economy of trade policy, and protection of intellectual property rights (IPR). I focus the first chapter of my PhD dissertation on cross-boarder IPR protection. I use a mixture of theory and empirical analysis to study the economic incentive that drives dual standards in IPR protections in a country's legal system. The second and third chapters of my dissertation focuses on trade policies of regional trade agreements (RTA), and particularly on identifying political and economic incentives for tariff cooperation between governments in free trade areas and its implications for the world trade system.