International trade and income convergence: Meta‐analysis

Abstract

We develop a meta‐analysis of the empirical literature that estimates the impact of international trade on income convergence between countries. We find that, on average, trade tends to generate inter‐country income convergence. Especially in more recent years, we identified a preference for publishing and citing studies that report a stronger effect of trade on convergence. We also find that the effect of trade on income convergence is sensitive to the characteristics of the countries included in the sample, data structure, and estimation techniques.