All Roads Lead to Rome: Global Air Connectivity and Bilateral Trade

Principal Investigator(s):  View help for Principal Investigator(s) Zheng Wang; Feicheng Wang; Zhuo Zhou

Version:  View help for Version V1

Name File Type Size Last Modified
Replication_package.zip application/zip 3.5 GB 03/24/2025 02:17:AM

Project Citation: 

Wang, Zheng, Wang, Feicheng, and Zhou, Zhuo. All Roads Lead to Rome: Global Air Connectivity and Bilateral Trade. Nashville, TN: American Economic Association [publisher], 2025. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2025-03-24. https://doi.org/10.3886/E224021V1

Project Description

Summary:  View help for Summary This replication package accompanies the paper "All Roads Lead to Rome: Global Air Connectivity and Bilateral Trade" by Zheng Wang, Feicheng Wang, and Zhuo Zhou. The study investigates how international air connectivity, by facilitating face-to-face interactions, impacts bilateral trade flows between countries. Utilizing a novel instrumental variable strategy based on exogenous variations in air connectivity through third-country transit hubs, this study analyzes itinerary-level global air passenger data from nearly all international scheduled flights between 2013 and 2018. The primary objective is to estimate the causal effect of improved air connectivity on trade, emphasizing differences across industries that require varying levels of relationship-specific investment and information exchange. The study demonstrates that enhanced air connectivity significantly boosts international trade, with particularly pronounced effects in industries that heavily rely on contract-intensive interactions and in the trade of new products. Additionally, the study examines how online communications may partially substitute in-person interactions, revealing nuanced complementarities and substitutive effects in facilitating international business transactions.
Funding Sources:  View help for Funding Sources The British Academy and the Sino-British Fellowship Trust ( SRG1920\100546)

Scope of Project

Subject Terms:  View help for Subject Terms Economics; international economics
JEL Classification:  View help for JEL Classification
      A10 General Economics: General
Geographic Coverage:  View help for Geographic Coverage Global
Time Period(s):  View help for Time Period(s) 2013 – 2018
Collection Date(s):  View help for Collection Date(s) 2018 – 2025
Universe:  View help for Universe Passenger flows and trade between countries in the world. 
Data Type(s):  View help for Data Type(s) aggregate data
Collection Notes:  View help for Collection Notes See README document.


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Published Versions

V1 [2025-03-24]

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