In simple words, free trade means free international trade. The classical economists like Adam Smith, Ricardo and others strongly favored free trade and this doctrine held the field for nearly one hundred years. How ever later, the countries all over the world began to adhere to the policy of imposing restrictions in one form or other. History and Development of Free Trade Zones During the last 20 years, the labor charges in developed countries have increased substantially. According to a recent estimate, the labor cost is nearly 1 USD per hour for semi-skilled workers in most European Countries, U.S and Japan. This high labor cost was due to the acute shortage of both skilled and unskilled labor in most of these countries. Countries like Germany, France, Switzerland, Sweden, Austria, Belgium and England even imported laborers from other countries. Therefore, the cost of production involving a considerable labor content has become Continue reading
International Business Management
International Trade Theory of Country Size and Technology Gap
Trade Theory of Country Size Country size has some definite relation to international trade as to what is traded, how much is traded and so on. The classical trade theories do not go into country-by-country differences in size to deal with the lines of specialization. When a small and big country are involved, the small country may be pushed into specialization, but not the big one for all its need for the other product can’t be produced by the other small country, nor that small country take all export surplus of the big nation resulting from specialization. Thus a nexus exists between global trade and country size. Vastness of Country size and Variety of Resources go together: Size of a country is measured by the geographical space here. Big countries have vast space and hence more and diverse resources. With that they could be self reliant. Considering their size, their Continue reading
Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) – Concept, Benefits and Weakness
For a sustainable growth and economic development of a country, innovation and creativity is a very important dimension. Industries and the global markets of the 21st century rest on the intellectual property protection as it is one of the central public policy. By the mid-1990s, a minimum global standard for IPR had been preserved in the WTO Charter through the incorporation of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). The transfer in international economic policy and the lowering of tariff and non-tariff trade barriers to the embrace of strong IPR is genuinely an issue of controversy. Intellectual property rights (IPR) are legal claims settled by governments within their relevant sovereignties that grant trademark, patents and owners of copyright the exclusive right to exploit their intellectual property for a certain period. The fundamental right for IPR protection is to provide an incentive for innovation by granting IP owners Continue reading
Factors Affecting Organizational Structure in Multinational Companies
The organization structure is an approach that helps and guides in organizing the employees of the organization into a structured and organized pattern for better coordination and communication. The structure in a multinational company defines the architecture of the business competence, functional relationship and management function. It helps in reducing confusion in the business environment and also supports in carrying out the business function smoothly and efficiently. The organization structure is affected by various internal and external factors which are also known as the organizational environment since organization works around these factors and the environment. The organizational environment consists of all those factors that influences the organizational working and thus can also influence the organizational structure since in each country and geographical areas the organizational environment would change. The external organizational environment that would influence the organizational structure is the economic, political and legal, socio-economic, technological and natural factors. All Continue reading
Reasons Behind the Financial Crisis of 2008
Financial crisis is a bubble created by excessive investor inclination towards a particular market. It shadows the valuations and when the bubble bursts, the investors want to exit and therefore rapidly start selling their stake. Too much of capital led to lower interest rates and this in return forced the investors to look for creative investment platforms where the yield was high. This requirement led to an unprecedented growth in the securitization market as the inclination towards such derivative instruments was high. Investors were willing to take higher risks as compared to the returns they would receive for their investments. Greed for higher returns, excessive leverage and low volatility led to the financial crisis of 2008. This low volatility which was a result of shadowed valuations led the borrowers to borrow over and above what their asset base allowed notwithstanding the criteria of credibility. 1. Low Volatility and High Leverage: Continue reading
Technology Transfer in International Business
Technology is a new variable in the equation of economic relations. Traditional theories of international business assumes that all nations have equal access to technology and, therefore, that there is no need to transfer technology from one county to another. Recent research findings have invalidated this assumption. In addition, they point to technology differences as primary cause of international inequalities in economic achievements. To reduce the inequalities, technology capabilities of the backward nations must be strengthened. The quickest way to do so is to transfer technology from the developed to the developing nations. Technology is any device or process used for productive purposes. In its broadest sense, it is the sum of the ways in which a given group provides itself with good and services, the group being a nation, an industry, or a single firm. There is a fundamental characteristic of technology that demands clear recognition. Q unites unlike Continue reading