TY  - JOUR
AU  - Slaughter, Matthew J
TI  - What Are the Results of Product-Price Studies and What Can We Learn From Their Differences?
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 6591
PY  - 1998
Y2  - June 1998
DO  - 10.3386/w6591
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w6591
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w6591.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Matthew J. Slaughter
Tuck School of Business
Dartmouth College
100 Tuck Hall
Hanover, NH 03755
Tel: 603/646-2939
Fax: 603/646-0995
E-Mail: matthew.j.slaughter@dartmouth.edu
M1  - published as Matthew J. Slaughter. "What Are the Results of Product-Price Studies and What Can We Learn from Their Differences?," in Robert C. Feenstra, editor, "The Impact of International Trade on Wages" University of Chicago Press (2000)

AB  - In recent years many economists have analyzed whether international trade has contributed to rising U.S. wage inequality by changing relative product prices.  In this paper I survey the findings of nine  product-price' studies which together demonstrate how the methodology of product-price studies has evolved.  I then synthesize the findings of these nine studies and draw two main conclusions.  The first conclusion is that this literature has a refined set of empirical strategies for applying the Stolper-Samuelson theorem to the data from which important methodological lessons can be learned.  The second main conclusion is that despite the methodological progress that has been made, research to date still has fundamental limitations regarding the key question of how much international trade has contributed to rising wage inequality.  Most importantly, more work needs to link exogenous forces attributable to international trade to actual product-price changes.
ER  -