The Macro-economic Impact of Cross-border eCommerce in the EU

Arbeitspapier

We use data on cross-border e-commerce between EU Member States to estimate the implied cross-border trade cost reduction when consumers move from offline to online consumption. We plug this trade cost estimate into a macro-sector multi-country CGE model to estimate the impact of online retailing on consumers as well as producers. We find that cross-border e-commerce increases real household consumption. However, the domestic spill-over effect squeezes price margins in the retail sector and has a negative output effect for that sector. The resulting retail sector efficiency gains have a positive effect on production in other sectors. The combined macro-economic effect of these transmission channels is generally positive for EU Member States, ranging between 0.07 and 0.25 per cent of GDP. As such, this paper adds an innovative macro-perspective to existing micro-economic estimates of the impact of e-commerce on consumer welfare.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: Institute for Prospective Technological Studies Digital Economy Working Paper ; No. 2014/10

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Empirical Studies of Trade ; Quantitative Policy Modeling
• Subject: e-commerce ; online trade ; cross-border trade ; international trade ; EU digital single market ; CGE model ; non-tariff barriers

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Francois, Joseph ; Martens, Bertin ; Yang, Fan
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): European Commission, Joint Research Centre (JRC)
• (where): Seville
• (when): 2014

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/202200
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:42 AM CET