Chapter 1 National Security and International Trade: A Simple General Equilibrium Model

Abstract

This chapter presents a general equilibrium model that embeds the issue of national security within a two-country Heckscher–Ohlin model of international trade. “National security” is defined as a public good that is an increasing function of a country's own defense expenditure and a decreasing function of the other country's defense expenditure. Defense is a non-traded public good produced by capital and labor, along with two tradable private goods in each country. The model is solved as a Nash equilibrium in defense expenditures and a Walrasian equilibrium for the two traded goods and the factors of production. It is shown that opening to international trade raises defense expenditures in each country since national security is a normal good in each of them. If defense is more capital-intensive than both tradable goods then trade lowers the cost of defense for the labor-abundant country and raises it for the capital-abundant country.

Citation

Findlay, R. and Amin, M. (2008), "Chapter 1 National Security and International Trade: A Simple General Equilibrium Model", Marjit, S. and Yu, E.S.H. (Ed.) Contemporary and Emerging Issues in Trade Theory and Policy (Frontiers of Economics and Globalization, Vol. 4), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 13-24. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1574-8715(08)04001-3