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American Economic Review, 102 (6), 2700-2733. Appendix Data and Programs

I use bilateral import data to test for and quantify the importance of trade costs and asset market frictions in explaining the failure of perfect international consumption risk sharing. I find that while frictions in international asset markets significantly impede optimal consumption risk sharing between developed and developing countries over the period 1970-2000, developed countries are close to optimal risk sharing with each other. Trade costs, in contrast, significantly impede risk sharing for all countries.