Bilateral Free Trade Agreement and Export:A Perspective of Binary Margin and Comparative Advantage
China must prioritize the upgrading and expansion of its high-standard free trade zones to effectively en-gage with the global trade network and construct a new open economic system of high level.Utilizing data from CEPII and BACI HS6,spanning 209 countries from 1995 to 2021,this study evaluates the impact of free trade agreements(FTAs)on China's export intensive and extensive margins.We incorporate trade costs and comparative advantage per-spectives,applying the PSM-SDID method.Baseline results indicate that FTAs substantially influence China's dual export margins,leading to a reduction in the extensive margin and a boost in the intensive margin.The event study un-covers a lagged effect of FTAs on these export margins.Mechanism analyses suggest that FTAs enhance the export of core products by ameliorating product quality.This uplift in quality subsequently diminishes the extensive margin and augments the intensive margin.Concurrently,FTAs optimize dual export margins by curtailing bilateral trade costs.Fur-ther analysis reveals that FTA impacts vary among different product categories.Overall,this study offers pivotal policy guidance for China as it contemplates deep trade agreement engagements and seeks to foster high-quality trade progres-sion
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