保护主义、逃避和家庭福利：来自尼日利亚进口禁令的证据
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Protectionism, Evasion and Household Welfare Evidence from Nigeria’s Import Bans Erhan ArtucGuillermo FalconeGuido PortoBob Rijkers Policy Research Working Paper11195 Abstract This paper analyzes the welfare impacts of import bans inNigeria and how these impacts are shaped by evasion. Banswere not effectively enforced, thus fostering informal trade.The imposition of bans nonetheless increased consumer were substantially attenuated for goods for which tradepolicy is harder to enforce. Import bans disproportionatelyhurt richer households, who likewise disproportionately Protectionism,EvasionandHouseholdWelfareEvidencefromNigeria’sImportBans ErhanArtucGuillermoFalconeGuidoPortoBobRijkers Keywords:taxevasion,mirrorstatistics,trade,corruption,exporters,importers,tariffs. 1Introduction While developing countries are more prone to protectionism than developed countries, they facegreater challenges enforcing trade policy in part because of the prevalence of corruption (Atkin This paper examines the welfare implications of import bans in Nigeria and how these are mod-ulated by trade policy evasion. First, we assess whether import bans were effectively enforcedby examining their impact on informal trade—a means of circumventing the bans. Second, weexploit rich CPI micro data to examine how much import restrictions have contributed to priceinflation.To assess the extent to which price pressures are attenuated by imperfect enforce- Import bans in Nigeria offer a suitable laboratory to assess the relationship between protection-ism, evasion and household welfare for a number of reasons. To start with, Nigeria is notoriously protectionist. It has repeatedly resorted to import bans to protect domestic industries, limitexchange rate fluctuations and minimize macroeconomic volatility.Importantly, the sectoralcomposition of import bans appears highly idiosyncratic: it is hard to anticipate which sectors Our main findings can be summarized as follows.Import bans are not effectively enforced.Many banned goods are traded informally and the imposition of bans triggers further increasesin evasion (proxied by discrepancies between the exports to Nigeria reported by source countries Finally, we quantify the first-order welfare impacts of both bans and evasion using a stylizedhousehold model that we calibrate with household survey data. By increasing prices, bans erode simulation shows that enhanced enforcement of bans would impose greater welfare losses onhigh-income households.By implication, evasion enhances welfare by mitigating these losses This paper builds on and aims to contribute to several strands of literature. First, it highlightsevasion as an explanation for the limited pass-through of tariffs and import bans to consumer prices (Fajgelbaum et al., 2020, Goldberg and Hellerstein, 2008, Cavallo et al.2021, Nicita Second, we contribute to the literature on tax and tariff evasion by quantifying their welfareeffects (Slemrod, 2007, Fisman and Wei, 2004, Demir and Javorcik, 2020, Mishra et al. 2008).This literature has predominantly focused on quantifying the revenue losses associated with Third and related, in doing so and by quantifying who pays for protectionism we contribute to the literature on the distributional impacts of trade (see e.g.Costinot and Rodriguez Clare,2014, Fajgelbaum and Khandelwal, 2016, Porto 2006, and Antràs, de Gortari and Itshkoki proximate locations. The remainder of this paper is organized as follows. The next section discusses our data andintroduces our proxies for evasion and evadability. Section 3 presents evidence suggesting bans 2Data and Evasion Measures 2.1Data This paper combines several sources of data, described below.All variable definitions, their Nigeria’s trade policy.We hired a law firm to assemble a dataset of Nigeria’s trade policies spanning the period 2001-2020. They collected annual information on tariffs, levies, VAT rates,and import bans at the HS6 product level.1The total tax rate paid by importers is calculated Meat, pharmaceuticals, textiles, leather, and apparel are among the most frequently bannedcategories (see Appendix Table A3 and A4).Banned goods are more likely to be consumer use, or characterized by high relationship-specificity (“stickiness”).This pattern aligns withthe government’s import-substitution objectives.2 Bans are not explicitly country-targeted, The overall prevalence of bans is linked to macroeconomic conditions (Appendix Figure A2).Bans occur more frequently when interest payments are high and the balance of payments is To gain further insight into which products are prone to bans, we visited Nigeria and interviewedinvestment professionals and several members of the tariff committee, the legislate authority incharge of recommending trade policy changes to the Minister of Finance, who in turn makes Trade policy of ECOWAS countries.Information on import tariffs imposed by countriesother than Nigeria
