Abstract

The Perceived Macroeconomic Uncertainty (PMU) is seen as unpredictable volatility about the future economic development at aggregate level. While prior research explains how uncertainty (in general) influences international trade flows, research on the role of PMU in international trade flows is scarce. This article attempts to address this lack of understanding. Utilizing the gravity model and multicountry level data, our results show that: (1) the level of PMU in both importing countries and exporting countries has a significant negative impact on exports, but the effect of PMU of importing countries is larger than that of PMU of exporting countries; (2) PMU in importing countries has a trade diversion effect, suggesting that exporters are more willing to export to countries with relatively lower level of PMU; (3) the negative effects of PMU on trade have declined after the 2008 Great Financial Crisis, which may be related to the relative stability of the PMU index since the Great Financial Crisis and the increased concern of traders about other factors, such as trade policy uncertainty and Sino-US economic conflicts. Our research enriches prior findings that examine the effects of uncertainty on trade flows and carries important policy implications.

摘要

感知宏观经济不确定性 (PMU) 被视为总体层面上未来经济发展的不可预测的波动性。虽然先前的研究解释了不确定性（一般而言）如何影响国际贸易流动，但关于 PMU 在国际贸易流动中的作用的研究却很少。本文试图解决这种缺乏理解的问题。利用引力模型和多国水平数据，我们的结果表明：（1）进口国和出口国的PMU水平对出口都有显着的负面影响，但进口国PMU的影响大于PMU的影响。出口国；（2）进口国的PMU具有贸易分流效应，说明出口商更愿意向PMU水平相对较低的国家出口；(3) PMU 对贸易的负面影响在 2008 年金融危机后有所下降，这可能与金融危机以来 PMU 指数相对稳定以及交易者对贸易政策等其他因素的担忧增加有关不确定性和中美经济冲突。我们的研究丰富了先前的研究结果，这些研究结果检查了不确定性对贸易流动的影响并具有重要的政策意义。