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Simon Lester

Simon Lester

Co-founder of WorldTradeLaw.net and China Trade Monitor. Non-resident fellow at the Baker Institute.

http://simonlester.com

Trade in Everything: Rocket Launches and Space Labs

From the AP: Space shuttle Discovery blasted off a seaside launch pad at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Saturday to deliver Japan's huge new research laboratory to the International Space Station . ... Kibo, a complex that cost Japan about $2 billion to manufacture, is being installed aboard

Winners and Losers from Free Trade

Via Greg Mankiw, I see that Economist Robert Driskill asks this question in an article in Foreign Policy: What if free trade is making a small percentage of the country much better off, but is hurting a much greater percentage (the “Joe Sixpacks”), as some argue is the case? Here&

Update on the Zeroing Negotiations

The Chair of the Negotiating Group on Rules has issued a new working document: http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/rulesneg_e/rules_may08_annexa_e.doc Of course, I skipped right to the zeroing part. Here's what the Chairman's Text (TN/RL/W/213)

Justice Kennedy for the Appellate Body?

If we can't stop internal domestic discrimination, how are we ever going to stop it in the international arena? The recent U.S. Supreme Court decision in Davis v. Kentucky Department of Revenue dealt with the issue of explict tax discrimination against out-of-staters. As explained on

The Role of Precedent at the WTO: What the Members Think

From the summary of the DSB meeting where the recent U.S. - Stainless Steel from Mexico case was adopted: There was a debate among members on whether or not panels were obliged to follow AB decisions. Some members argued that prior AB rulings constituted a clear line of jurisprudence that

Protectionism for English Footballers

From the Economist: The [English] Premier League's main source of strength is its financial clout. Since the early 1990s, when stadiums were upgraded and lucrative broadcasting deals agreed upon, the league has become a money-spinner. Foreign investors have poured in (Liverpool and Manchester United are owned by

McCain on Other Benefits of Trade Agreements

Trade talk would be much more straightforward if trade agreements were only about trade, but things are never that simple. Here John McCain points out one of his non-trade reasons for supporting the Colombia FTA: The strategic implications of rejecting this agreement are profound. Colombia is a beacon of

A Final Word on Food Aid and the Farm Bill

Well, maybe not the final word, but one more thing anyway, from a Bloomberg article: Shipments of U.S. food aid took five months to reach Ethiopia during a famine in 1999-2000, arriving after the death toll had reached 20,000, according to Chris Barrett, an economics professor at

New Paper on Development and Human Rights under WTO law

Here's a new paper from Gillian Moon of University of New South Wales, entitled "The WTO-Minus Strategy: Development and human rights under WTO law." The abstract: International trade law, human rights law and development studies share the common objective of promoting higher standards of living

Protectionism and Wind Power

From a WSJ blog: We’ve noted before how China’s headlong push into wind power could put pressure on the rest of the global wind industry. Chinese turbines need the same scarce components as the turbines being built and installed in Europe, India, and the U.S. Now that