1) You will need information on the total land area of countries, the % of land area that is arable, and the labor force (employed + unemployed, a measure of how many people are active in a labor market in a country). The World Bank compiles data on each economic variable below:
Arable land:http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/AG.LND.ARBL.ZS
Total land area:http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/AG.LND.TOTL.K2
Labor force:http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SL.TLF.TOTL.IN
We will focus on two countries: Japan and Ukraine.
Compute the ratio of labor (labor force) to arable land (in square kilometers) in Japan and Ukraine. Which country is land-abundant? Which country is labor-abundant? Please use data from the year 2013.
Suppose there are two products: wheat and televisions. Wheat is land-intensive and televisions are labor-intensive. According to the Heckscher-Ohlin theory of trade, which country would export televisions? Which country would export wheat?
Examine the exports of each country using the following data compiled by MIT:
http://atlas.media.mit.edu/en/profile/country/jpn/
http://atlas.media.mit.edu/en/profile/country/ukr/
Do the exports of each country generally match the predictions of the Heckscher-Ohlin theory of trade? Hint: You may want to toggle HS2 under depth on the export diagram to get a better idea of the categories of products the countries export.