"Geography and Ownership as Bases for Economic Accounting" provides a forum for leading specialists in trade and international economics to explore whether changes in the world economy have increased the usefulness of international accounts drawn up on the basis of ownership rather than on geography. The papers in this volume suggest that ownership-based national accounts are helpful in understanding trade and financial transactions among globalized enterprises. Individual chapters emphasize this perspective through accounting exercises, studies of individual countries, and studies of foreign...

How the government arrives at its official economic statistics deeply influences the lives of every American. Social Security payments and even some wages are linked to import prices through official inflation rates; special measures of national product are necessary for valid comparisons of vital social indicators such as relative standards of living and relative poverty. Poor information can result in poor policies. And yet, federal statistics agencies have been crippled by serious budget cuts and more cuts may lie ahead.
Questioning the quality of current data and analytical...

There is growing consensus among international trade negotiators and policymakers that a prime area for future multilateral discussion is competition policy. Competition policy includes antitrust policy (including merger regulation and control) but is often extended to include international trade measures and other policies that affect the structure, conduct, and performance of individual industries. This study includes country studies of competition policy in Western Europe, North America, and the Far East (with a focus on Japan) in the light of increasingly globalized activities of business...