Virtual Trade in a Changing World: Comparative Advantage, Growth and Inequality

Virtual economic transactions have radically transformed the way we think about trade and markets in closed and open economies. Continuous decline in costs of information and communications and setting up of phenomenally large number of virtual platforms have brought in 'Time' as an essential element in the discourse on international trade. This work delves deep into the issue of how Time enters as a major catalyst of international trade and virtual transactions. This changes the way we look at ideas of comparative advantage, factor mobility, growth, income distribution, and allied concepts. A key result is that greater physical distance might encourage trade contrary to what we are accustomed to accept.