Evidence on the impact of labor provisions in preferential trade agreements

This chapter reviews the literature on the effect of the introduction of labor provisions in preferential trade agreements.

Until recently, impact studies have suffered from data constraints and imprecise approaches to defining or coding labor provisions.

This is now changing thanks to efforts to create comprehensive and fine-grained datasets on labor provisions, such as the Labor Provisions in Trade Agreements (LABPTA) dataset, which hold the promise of new and steady accumulation of knowledge.

Findings from studies using the new data sources suggest more positive effects on labor standards and developing country exports than prior scholarship suggest.